Bravo!! Your article really speaks to me! Came along at a right time. My father was just diagnosed with cancer and we have no idea how things are gonna go.
I see myself in your description of your father (my father) and I wonder if I will end up as you describe some 30-40 years down the road. On the one hand I hope not (not to disparage), but on the other would it be so bad? In some ways, I would be disappointed, but others I would proud to do as well.
I am afraid that I know the answer for me, and so far, I'm not cutting the mustard.
Thank you for this piece. Really provocative!
I truly don't mean to speak ill of your father, but to paraphrase (maybe wrongly), you painted a picture and asked is this OK? Is this all?
Only each person can answer for themselves and each persons answer may well be different in similar circumstances.
Once again. Thanks!
This is the thing and likely in his head he lived a full life and by most people's lives, he lived a fuller life than most. For me, it is more a reflection on my own shortcomings than his and I know that I am far behind the eightball at this stage of life.
I lost my mother to cancer in 2004 but I hope that it works out for your dad. The treatments are getting pretty good these days so there is always hope.
Exactly! It's almost as if my father is acting as a mirror. I am not really seeing his shortcomings, but because of our similarities, my own. Many of the things that I see, he would not even regard as shortcomings. The fact that I do makes me feel a bit guilty, but I should not because what I am really evaluating is myself.
Anyway it is producing somewhat of a crisis of urgency for me right now. Kind of a shit or get off the pot mentality.
Anyway, enough of my rambling! Be well and don't be a stranger to your dad. Even when he doesn't "know" you, he "feels" you. I am going to heed this advice myself.
Thank you for helping me to see, even though you couldn't know that when writing and I don't know you or your dad.
I have this feeling and it is part of the reason I push so hard these days.
The best and most welcome help is the help that arrives unintended and blind to the circumstances of others. I can't take any credit for it is what I mean but, I am glad you found some value in there somewhere because that is my own hope for my work.