Filmsane

This is a post about my father. And forgiveness. And love. All right now. Let’s begin.

As today the world celebrates Father’s day, I’m in need to join in these celebrations. I too have a father, but I didn’t always have relationship with him. Well, at least not the relationship I have with him today.

You see, me and my sister are byproducts of a bad toxic marriage between two vastly different people. I can’t emphasize that enough. The difference in characters, upbringing, age, religious and political affiliations and so on. They’re different in so many ways; I often wondered how these two people ever get married in the first place. And in part, their different personalities, was the main reason for the clashes, fights and animosity. I’ve witnessed a lot of physical violence from him (towards my mom) and that made me resent him even more over the years. Those things made just made the distance between me and him to grow for the better part of my life. He was angry, violent and short-tempered man and I was genuinely scared of him. With him the violence was a bit of nature VS nurture. His father used to beat his wives (he got married several times) and it’s what he saw. That was all he knew to do.

Growing up, he was the sole breadwinner in our family and that made things even more difficult for us. But the fact that he worked nonstop is just an excuse. In the time when he didn’t work he would always find an excuse to be away from me and my sister. So basically when he was at home he would terrorize us, and when he was absent I relished the peace and quiet for a brief period of time.

You can safely say that I didn’t have any relationship with my father until my late 20’s and early 30’s. But something changed in the past few years. I think he came to the realization that he missed out on a lot of things, and the years that he was uninterested in his children was a shame far too much to bare. His marriage never changed, but his relationship with his two children did. And I’m really thankful for that.  He’s months shy from retirement and as I approach my wedding, I think he’s working hard on making amends. He’s trying to be more attentive, kinder, and generous.

He’s the father I’ve always wanted him to be. He’s now never too tired or busy to take me to work, he calls me several times a week and he even formed a special bond with my future husband. I guess he sees him as the son he never had. But the relationship between me and him changed as well. As I grow older and in the process of forming my own family, I learned to accept him and forgive him. Oh, not quite for everything, but for the majority of the things he did. I guess people can change and I guess it’s never too late for that.

So, happy Father’s day my formerly absent father! Love you.