Daddy’s Home
(it’s okay you can laugh - my skirt is an ensemble with the freaking curtain!)
As a woman I thought that the most overwhelming and overpowering relationship that one could ever have was with their mother. However, I’m coming to realize that just as important is your relationship with your ……father.
We always focus, when it comes to fathers on boys/men and missing fathers. However, there are a whole slew of us who still have Daddy issues and they range from not qualifying to just missing them to never knowing them.
My family has daddy issues. It became apparent to me this past Sunday as I sat in a kiddie movie "The Spiderwick Chronicles" Simple enough pretty good damn movie about trolls, hogwashes and orges. Well there was a subplot about a woman who watched her father disappear when she was around 9. She was 82 years old and still had hopes that one day her father would walk down the drive to come get her. Well the stars of the movie did what they did and it presented an opportunity to see him. He was in a state of the past so he didn’t reflect his now 125 years of age. He walked down that drive and her eyes lit up. He explained that he couldn’t leave fairy land or he would obviously die - so she asked to go with him. He took her hand and magically she was transformed to that 9 year old and they walked off into the sunset surrounded by fairies.
Emotion overtook me like a thunder storm and I actually cried out in the movie! I dissolved into a heap of shoulder shaking tears. When you lose your Daddy, all you want is one more moment..just one. 
I recovered enough to look at mini-me sitting next to me and a single tear made it’s way slowly down her face….yea she got Daddy issues too.
My Daddy was my world
He taught me so much about love and life, he seemed to understand when my mom didn’t even want to try and he was my rock. I was a Daddy’s girl and everyone knew it. I remember he used to come up to my elementary school and bring me KFC for lunch. He signed a sheet saying that I was delicate and needed to be exempt from gym, he got on my step mom about me washing dishing when I had such long lovely nails (LOL). He had an opportunity to meet Sakinah’s father but died shortly thereafter at the age of 54 from a massive heart attack. I mourn the lost of my daddy all the time. I still can’t wrap my mind around the fact that he didn’t get to see not one of his Grandchildren, that he didn’t get to meet Caun or that he isn’t here to rescue me. I can’t listen to "I Did It My Way" because that is what they played at his funeral. I JUST got enough courage to stand in the card section during Fathers Day and not break down. As all encompassing as my continued grief over 20 years since his death is - I have no comprehension of what it might feel like to have a ‘feeling’ about your daddy, but not remember him. 
Mini Me’s daddy passed when she was six months old. She has about 22 pictures of them together, one video tape, and some other odds and ends. She has the stories and what not and surprisingly after all of these years, you can still smell him in the leather of his gloves I saved for her, but she doesn’t have him. She has this void that though how beautiful her and Caun’s relationship is - that can’t be filled. How do you look at pictures of a man looking just like you holding you - yet you don’t remember?
So many of us in our community have so many family issues - they almost overtake us. We could go on and on about these things, I just felt the need to talk about those of us who had an active live everyday father in our lives and what we might be feeling if he is no longer there due to death. If any of you can relate or have a story to share - please do. I will be checking back on this subject to interact with you.
Jaila Says:
I had one momentarily but not one to look up to. So I stand on the sidelines and wonder what it feels like to have such admiration and respect for a man that you didnt have to work to earn.
All I can do is wish.
And see the pain on my daughters faces as they see what I see. Nothing when they look through the window toward their fathers and nothing is on the other side.
And I still, at 34 wish I had a “daddy”.
Posted on February 27th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Ondrea Says:
Same here. My father is alive and just….well… around. When I was a kid I thought he was the best dad ever even though he was never around and was never involved in anything I did as I was growing up (even now). It wasn’t until I became an adult and had kids of my own that I realize my father was not a good father at all. I begin to see in my kid’s father all the things my father was and I did not like it! He didn’t even bother te redeem himself with my kids. I have so much animosity towards him now. I am his inly child for God’s sake yet he had to be reminded of my birthday (by my stepmother) every year. But let me forget his birthday. I don’t talk to him much and he feels like I should call him and visit. Well, I have a phone and a home, too! To this day he still does not want to have to do anything, but expects me to call him daddy, which I refuse to do anymore.
It is equally important for girls to have their fathers around because it shapes them and their views on men. I have had so many issues because of my father, just wanting a man to just love me and make me feel so important. It’s the lack of importance my father showed me that makes me need it when I should feel important simply because of how I feel about myself. Somehow, that just isn’t enough. I could write forever on this so I will stop here.
Great post Pam, that hit home today!
Posted on February 27th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
Monica C. Says:
Great post, and great pictures. And Lawd, Mini Me was a beautiful baby.
My dad is handsome, charismatic, bright, articulate, and when I was young, I thought he hung the moon. He and my mom divorced (well, separated) when I was 3.
My dad had married once, before my mom @ age 19, and had 2 kids from that marriage. Then he had another daughter with his first wife while he was married to my mom (like, must have been when my mom was pregnant). Then, he has me. Then, he “married” again (they were together something like 14 or 15 years) and had 3 kids. He’s now married again (he and my mom finally legally divorced, LOL and he legally maried his current wife) and they have 3 kids together. Oh, and I forgot about the daughter who is also scandalously close in age to me, whom no one knew about until I was in college.
With all of those children, and his hustling, hard working, dreaming, restless mentality, that didn’t leave much room for his attending my parent-teacher conferences. He also lived about 7 hours away from me, growing up.
We have never had a traditional father-daughter relationship. I have always held fast that none of it bothers me, that it has always been this way, but in reality, I know better. A girl needs her father. It’s complicated!
Posted on February 27th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
Monica C. Says:
OK, WordPress is tripping!
Posted on February 27th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
AR Gal Says:
Goodness, I’m lookin at this pic of Mini-me (what a beautiful little baby she was) and her father. The date just stands out so much…1994. Has it really been that long ago??!! My niece was born in April of that year. Sorry, just a really random thought.
Mini-me and I are pretty much in the same boat only she (and her father) were afforded the opportunity to meet one another. My dad and I weren’t so lucky. He passed while my mom was pregnant with me. I’ve thought often of how different I would have been if he had been in my life. Stories from family and friends about him helped to somewhat fill that void but it’s not the same. I can honestly say that at 30, even without having met him, that I miss my daddy.
Great post.
Posted on February 28th, 2008 at 6:43 pm