Kurt R.A. Giambastiani

Ronald Achilles Giambastiani

Yesterday was Father’s Day here in the U.S., and it was a rather difficult one for me. Unexpectedly so.

My pop died back in 2016, at the age of eighty-six. His final years were not pleasant for him (nor for us, in many ways). He’d outlived two wives, had lost a lot of his vitality due to emphysema and spinal stenosis, and the whole “estate” thing—rewriting wills, selling his home, moving into assisted living, etc.—took a terrible emotional toll on him. But his death was eight years ago, and while the first few Father’s Days were understandably difficult, I’d weathered those that followed with an increasing sense of love, serenity, and gratitude for the Old Man.

So, why did this one hit me hard?

I spent much of the day looking at that question, wondering, wanting an answer. It seemed so random. Was I just on edge due to [gestures to the world at large]? No; the world’s Turmoil Coefficient has been in the red for several years, now. Was I suddenly aware of my own mortality? Hehe; not really, as that has been on my mind pretty much since Dad died (the death of one’s parents will do that to you). So, then, what?

When I finally pinned my brain to the mat on this (and trust me, my brain is an eel in this regard), it turned out (to my chagrin) to be all about me. Specifically, teenage me.

Within all of us, I believe, is what the woo-woo folks call our “inner child,” that part of our psyche that still thinks (and, more importantly, feels things) like a child. We carry our past with us, our memories of years irretrievable, and they affect us. Like when a certain song comes on, or you catch a whiff of a distinctive scent, or someone says something entirely random that transports you back through the decades, and you react, sometimes strongly, sometimes illogically, with happiness, sadness, anger, fear, you name it. For instance, here in Seattle, whenever the conditions are right, the wind carries the scent of low tide in from the shore, the air heavy with the aromas of salt, mud, kelp, and moisture, and when I take a lungful I am suddenly five years old walking barefoot through the toe-squishy, pebble-strewn shores of San Pablo Bay, and I am inexplicably happy. (I love days when that happens.)

So there’s a part of me still, even though my dad is long gone, an ancient part of me, that “burgeoning young man” part, that yet seeks his nod, that wants him to be proud of me.

And this year, the year of my retirement, is in many ways the culmination of my labors, and my dad did not live to see me reach it.

My dad never really understood me. He told me that, directly, and more than once. He never “got” the whole of me, never understood how my mind worked, couldn’t see how or why I could drop one interest, the focus of years, and pick up something entirely new. He never understood how I could remain constantly “on task” while continuously shifting gears. In short, to him, I was an enigma, unravel-able. Yes, he was proud of some of my achievements—my books, for example—but those were shining moments in time. Overall, I think I was too much of a mixed bag to warrant his unequivocal stamp of approval.

And yet, yesterday, it is what my heart wanted. And couldn’t get, of course.

Dad wasn’t a demonstrative man. He always held something in reserve, kept a large chunk of himself private. I have my theories as to why, but in part it’s just what his generation did. I know he loved me, warts and all, as he did all of his children, but in my own desire to be the kid no one had to worry about, I became, in part, the hidden child, the child no one really saw.

In twenty years I will reach the age at which my dad passed. I hope I have that much time (and a bit more, if I’m honest). But a father’s pride is out of reach for me now.

Luckily, I’m satisfied with my own.

k

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