Peace of Mind

*Consider this an epilogue to my piece, “My Father’s Son”. It was finished about 3 weeks ago, but was held back while I waited for a friend to scan the images. I have to give very special thanks to my step-mother. She did not have to answer my questions; she did not have to address the situation. Hell, she did not have to accept me. But she did all of those things, unquestioningly. And in the course of a 2 hour conversation, questions were answered, some long-standing open wounds healed, and some chapters were closed. And some peace was gained, I think by both parties involved in that conversation. Thank you for showing me love and respect, when you did not have to.



I guess you’re wondering why a 30-year old man has so many hang up about his father. There are many children who are the products of single-parent homes, who also fall under the classification of “love-child”. And I am sure many of them don’t give 2 thoughts about their father, especially if he was never there. Well, as I spelled out in my previous posts, I am my father’s son. And it goes beyond my tastes. The pic below should explain it. But there is more.

Unbeknownst to me, I worked with a close friend of my father for the better part of 6 months. The man never said anything, and neither did my aunt. I just knew him from passing him in the hallways. But I will always remember the first time I met him in the corridors of this company. I was polite as usual and said my good morning (old school upbringing: always say good morning even if you don’t know them). He has yet to reply to this day. More strangely, the first time he saw me, he literally turned white (you should know how hard this is for us people of colour), and kind of stepped around me. It was as if he had seen a ghost. Our future meetings in the corridor were never as dramatic as that first one, but he would always give me a very strange look. Only much later, after giving me a ride home from work, did he let on that he knew my dad. And in a very round about way at that. Even my step-mother made the same comment when we spoke on Saturday. She literally told me that it felt like she was speaking to a ghost. The resemblance surpasses just my looks apparently, and encompasses my gestures, personality and mannerisms. But the thing that kept nagging at me the most, is the way my mother always insisted that I at least try to get to know my dad, even when I made it explicitly clear that I wanted nothing to do with him.

So on Saturday night, I picked myself up with the intention of going to pick up my dad’s jazz collection that my step-mom was giving to me (there go the similarities again). And in the course of doing that I asked her what kind of person my dad. I did not get the exact answer I was looking for, but the question that was answered for me, is worth way more than what I originally asked. I basically got the answer to why my father “abandoned” me.

I left out what now is an important part of the story in my previous posts. See for the better part of my life, I always heard that my dad was sick. And my standard reply to that was “come on, n*gga, how sick can you be?” Well, I found out. My dad had lupus. It’s an autoimmune disease. He was diagnosed in 1983. At that point, he was barely capable of taking care of himself, and only got progressively worse. Why is that date so relevant? Well if you remember my last post, the last time I remember seeing my dad, was around when I was four. I was born in 1979. I googled lupus yesterday. I breathed a sigh of relief when I finally read that it usually isn’t genetically transmittable (I know that may sound bad, but it’s the truth. I did). Lupus is so fucked up, that it is given to differential diagnosis students as a case study (House, the TV character, specializes in differential diagnosis). Why? Because it is that difficult to diagnose. It attacks everywhere, and looks like everything. So basically, I have spent my life not knowing my dad, because his immune system decided one day that it did not recognize the rest of his body. So it started attacking it.

I heard all the stories. The renal failure. The pain. His hearing phantom sounds. The list of drugs he took. How he lasted 17 years, when he was only supposed to last around 5 (yea, apparently I got my trademark stubbornness from him). And after all of that, she gave me a picture that he bought after I was born, on one of his forays out the house, that he kept in his study.

I also heard that my birth was not easy for him to deal with on a number of different levels. I figured that there was a level of shame connected to me and my mom, but I never realized what he went through. (I won’t elaborate due to the fact that I do believe that some things should stay private.) In short, I understand him better now. And I feel the need to apologise to him.

So, Dad, I am sorry. I jumped to conclusions without knowing the full story. I was too stubborn to find out truth about why you were never there, even when I was presented with the opportunity. I was content to wallow in ignorance. I never gave you a fair shake when I was forming my misguided opinions. I wish things could have been different, and I could have gotten to know you beyond tales and pictures. But I guess this is what will have to do. Thank you for the qualities you gave me, and the family you left me. I will treasure them. Love you.