Friday, May 8, 2009

Who's your (grand) Daddy?

Tomorrow is my father's birthday. He's a loser. Well, to me he is. He may very well be a great dude to the people currently in his life; who knows? I can't actually come up with a more unremarkable person that I know.

Since my parents split in 1981, I have seen him 4 times and the last time we spoke, he called to ask for money. He's been invited here to meet my husband and the kids, he's been given email addresses and cell phone numbers... He is the kind of person that (I suppose) lives much better in denial. I assume it's too painful for him with each passing year to find a way to re-connect. So there he is, in Michigan (might as well be Madagascar) and here I am, we are, in New York. Ruby used to ask about him, Penelope never does and only time will tell what Lincoln brings to the party.

Weird thing is, my mom (who lives 10 minutes from me) is turning into the same kind of person. She waits for me to call, to show up at her door, to invite. She has told me it's my duty, as the daughter, to make these overtures (that's my word, not hers).

So, a healthy paranoid person can't help but wonder: Is it me? I am pretty in touch with my shady side. I can be a fucking jerk. But I can also be a lot of really great things. And then there are the kids. We have a new baby that my mother has seen 4 times. It hurts so much to type it. Fuck. The kids are tantalizing, succulent things! I can't fathom how their grandparents, these grandparents, can let them slip away.

I look so much like my father it's creepy. Cree-pee. And I carry around a nice dose of his temper, his insecurities & clumsiness. I can't get away from the guy, not that I'm trying, mind you. But sometimes the fucker sneaks up on me he like a gorilla; a gorilla clinging to me so hard that he shoves me into the dirt and won't let me get up.

Don't suggest therapy. I'll be fine in a little while.