Daddy

Daddy did you know how much I loved you?  Did you know I loved doing everything with you?  Riding on the tractor, skinning deer, watching you trim horses feet, when you would put me on your shoulders, riding in your pick-up truck and sticking my hand out the window to surf the wind, waiting patiently as you talked to neighbors or friends on old country roads, getting on the motorcycle behind you when you picked me up from school that way and holding on to your belt for safety, when you tickled me while holding me upside down or chasing me around the living room before bath time.  Daddy did you know I loved you?  I thought you were the best and coolest dad there was.  I was the one that rode with you on horseback or snowmobile.  I adored you!

I wish I could have learned so much from you.  I am like you in so many ways.  I love the land, I am a natural farmer, I am a hunter, I feel revived from nature, I am a woman of few words but the words I say are usually meaningful and I like to observe people more than say much to or about them.   There is one other way we are alike and that is when it’s difficult to span the gap of pain and feelings I’d rather just shut don’t than deal with the present situation.  Daddy did you know I heard you when mom and you were divided things in the divorce.  Did you know I heard you say you would have taken my sister but not me?  Did you know that told me what you thought about me?  Did you know it probably made me feel I could never trust another man?  Did you know that told me all those times you acted like you cared about me maybe I was wrong.  Maybe I had wasted my time trying to be Daddy’s girl.  Hearing you that day and knowing now it was probably just fighting meant to hurt my mom was not really your truth but that along with years of my mom saying “he doesn’t love you” and plenty of examples of you not caring that much didn’t help.

Starting thirteen years ago we tried to have a relationship with each other due to a lovely little sister I wanted to have a part of in my life.  It was really a great time for me.  A time I felt really  loved by you.  A time you kind of taught me things.  Things I wanted to know like the mountains I grew up roaming, the jeep paths into the forest, the hay business and demands of it, the joy that could come from drives in the woods and so much more.  I thought maybe I would have you in my life for the rest of it.  You gave me a little filly horse that has become one of my best friends and a great companion.  We talked on the phone for hours.  You told me about family and friends and animals in the area.  We went camping  together.  I took you to the fields in the early glow of morning in the jeep that you taught me to drive a little better with a stick.  And the one thing I wasn’t sure you would do nor would I ever get to experience…you walked me down the aisle of my wedding.  It was something I absolutely glowed about because I knew how damn sick you were that day and you still showed up.  After that I barely saw you again.   I guess with all good things they must end.  Somehow along this life there has been a lot of hurt.  I don’t know if I ever trusted you loved me and maybe I ruined it.  Ever since that day of the wedding though I felt you wrote me off.  I felt you didn’t want much to do with me after that.  You would go visit my cousin but not come the extra miles to see me.  Every time I learned about this my heart listened to that voice..”.I would have taken her sister”.  I just can’t let go of the pain or believe you ever wanted to be my dad.  

You got to do it over again.  You got a new little girl to love and cherish and forget your old life.  A life full of loss of two little girls and a wife.  I’m sure you were very lonely and couldn’t handle all the pain but like a man with strength you did handle it.  You got a new start and probably I was just a reminder of the disaster and loss.  Now she’s grown up and still you get a relationship with her.  I don’t know her anymore and I don’t know you anymore.  It’s like the family I almost had turned its back on me.  I’ve also talked to you a little here and there but it seems like there is bitterness there.  I don’t know what I did but I know what you did…you just have stopped living and trying.  So the dad I almost got to know is gone for good.  You beat the cancer but you lost you spirit.  What was the point?  The point is your ARE still alive.  You could still be my dad.  You could still try and yet you don’t and I can’t anymore.  There is just too much rejection and disappointment to go there anymore.  Either way though I will keep the memory that I will always love you and pretend you were the dad I thought I had as a little girl.