Father’s Day is coming up, so this is your obligatory Father’s Day post.
Thank God that I am not my father’s son. Well, genetically I am, but I hope and pray that I have gotten out of me every bit of him spiritually, emotionally, nurturally (no, it’s not a word, but I am college graduate now and I can make things up), and just about anything else. Why?
Granted, there are some who have had worse parents, I’ve met a few, actually; however, the man is a sick and twisted individual intent on abuse and control, fanaticism, and willing to do every bad things in the name of his god. I’ll leave it at that. If I could show you the lives that he has destroyed, perhaps you would see and believe me, but otherwise, it would do no good to tell you about it. Most of it is unbelievable.
But, I have found healing in the arms of God. It is not easy sometimes, to deal with a few things, but through God I have erased the things that I was shown and replaced them with things that I know to be truth. Yes, he did do lots of damage, but along the way, I had a grandfather, a wonderful, dear old man, who took me in in the midst of a very bad time in my life. I spent barely a year with him, before he died suddenly, but in that year, I was able to take something from him that I still have. There has been other positive male figures in my life along the way which have helped me to find a better picture of a father, husband and man who what one half of my genetic make-up showed me.
For the good in my life, I can give no other reason but God. It is not my counseling or therapy, or rebellion, or drowning myself in every form of vice known to a person that I have found comfort, but only in the wonder-working power of God Almighty. He has been a constant friend and a shelter, a help, a presence, in my life as I grew, rebelled, experimented in vices, and finally found my way back to him. I gave give no credit for my healing – sometimes I am still in ICU – except to God the Father.
I have three children of my own now, and I am married to my wife – first and only, although sometimes, to irritate her, I introduce her as my first wife – which is an accomplishment as I look around my immediate family. I love her and she loves me. My children and I have a good relationship, although it is not perfect. I sometimes feel like David, in that I can only go so far with the amount of blood in my past, but my children will be able to build that perfect house. My daughter is 8, my son is 6, and my youngest daughter is 8 months. They still have a nuclear family. Awesome.
But, it is not by my hand that this is happening, but through God. Through Christ. Not by me.
It is real easy to know what to do – I just look at the parental tissue donor as an example and do everything opposite. In loving my wife, I look at my grandfather and the Song of Songs, Christ and the Church. In loving my children, I think about the failures and hurt feelings my youth and try not to replicate it, especially leaving out the anger and abuse.
My wife and I, rightly or wrongly, have cut that part of the family – and generally, if the last name now ends or has ended in Watts, then it is cut off – from our children. Safer that way, really. (My mother, who died when I was 17, had a wonderful family and I still keep in touch with my surviving great aunts who are truly wonderful people.)
So, this Sunday, I will celebrate Father’s Day with hand-made paper crafts that for the life of me, I cannot decipher, and when told what they really are, will agree and tell them that is the best thing ever. Father’s Day is not a highlight, really, as I have witnessed the births of all my children, sharing their milestones with their mother, and come home to them and their mother nightly. Every day that we can make it as a family, every day of healing, is a Father’s Day for me.
Okay, that’s it.
