A Letter To Daddy

Dear Daddy,

You helped give me life. I guess I should start out by saying "thank you" for that.

Those budding moments when I was a little one... back when my heart was whole, and my eyes were closed to the hatefulness of the world. I saw the picture of when Mama held me for the first time, and I saw her face aglow, as was yours on that day.

I remember so much from way back then, back when the world was full of light and innocence, and truth, and back when you seemed to have loved my mother as much as you loved me. When did all of that change?

You were in and out of my life so much, that it is a wonder that I even remembered you at all. I don't have many good moments left to remember nowadays. Time has taken pretty much everything from me. Anything that even remotely brings a smile to my face seems to get stolen in some way. I have found it useful to not smile at all anymore.

All my life, I've wondered about that picture. Were you truly happy? Was it all a front? I have to make sense of it all. Sure, you and mother had your problems... hell, even you and I had our problems, and things were said and done that I could never forgive you for. Even so, you left and stayed gone. I grew up without you, and I ended up hating you for it.

After high school, I came back to a town from my deepest memories in hopes to find you and throw you completely out of my heart. I no longer had a heart at all once you uttered those emotionless words to me, "Angel, your Mama's dead." If you could only imagine the indescribable sorrow and agony I felt, and the anger I felt in the events after... how I reached out for you despite my rage at you... for my father, for somebody on this earth to care about me and hold me. You didn't even care or try to console me. I didn't expect you to, but the gesture would have been nice.

My whole reason to live was taken from me that day, and every day since. I lost more than my mother. I lost more than a parent... I lost all of my things; all of my friends, my old home, my old pets... I literally lost everything except one suitcase, and what few things I could grab before the devil my mother dated and I killed each other.

Physically, I had an inheritance, a large suitcase, and a funeral bill to start over with. Emotionally, I had to start over with absolutely nothing, and no real support whatsoever.

I'm proud to say that I made it through hell this past six years. Everyone else can still pretend that nothing happened, but I won't forget. I can't forget, and I cannot forgive. I was cheated, I was lied to, I was used, and plotted against!

Someone had told me as I saw my mother's dead face in that godawful coffin box that I had to be so strong because "God always takes the strongest first." I gladly told this person that I was sick of being so strong, and that if somebody should be strong, it should be her, so that she would die next. What an awful thing to say to me, Daddy. You however, never said a word. That actually hurt me so much worse. That little black stain that saying nothing at all left in my heart never did go away from me. Not once did you be there for me. Not once did you comfort me. Not once did you have the audacity to reach out to me.

I was so decent to give you a chance to view Mama, something she would have hated me for, and something that everyone else since has hated me for... but I wanted to give you that last chance to apologize to her for the hell you put her through. I don't think you took it. I feel as if I had fallen from grace by giving you the smallest hint of a chance back then.

I have to admit, I still hate your guts for a lot of things, but I understand you're getting older, and my sanity has become more corrupted than ever. For my own sake, I need to let go of some things. I understand that I will hate myself to death if I don't.

It's hard to grow up without a father. I can honestly say that doing so has screwed me up. Maybe it was for the best that you weren't there for me growing up. Who knows how much worse I would have been if you had actually been there.

I used to think that the problems you had with Mama was my fault. I grew up thinking things were wrong with me... like I was nothing but a burden and a disappointment to everyone. I kept thinking that that was why you left.

I used to think that no matter what I did, it would never be good enough to make you stick around, and it's no surprise that I think of myself as a thing lower than dirt on this earth. I have impossible standards for myself, and I will go to my grave feeling so inadequate.

Did you have to tease me by coming back when I was nine and ten? Did you have to leave yet again, and not let my new brother get to know you either? I have to admit while I am admitting things, that six years ago when I found out that I had a long lost half sister who was adopted, I was jealous because she went her entire life not knowing that you even existed. That she and I shared the same biological father, and she had it so good to be kept in the dark about you...

Nonetheless, I grew up. I am who I am today, and I honestly can't say that a lot of who I am is positive much anymore. I have to come to consider myself one of those night flowers, those who only know how to bloom in darkness... especially since my life has only been the teabag boiling in the kettle of black.

Out of the goodness of my impossibly shattered heart, I have attempted to give you another chance to be in my life. It's not forgiveness by a long shot, so don't get your hopes up like I did once. I'm not your enemy, you know. If I were your enemy, I could have had you killed a thousand times now. God knows you've killed me more times than that, but I digress. I used to wish I could bleed myself dry because your blood was the same as mine, but nothing can change the fact that I'm your daughter.

I honestly felt nothing when I visited you at your house last month. It's better than feeling bitterness, animosity, and hate. Maybe I am letting go a little after all, and maybe that can be a good thing. You don't deserve a snowball's chance in hell, but you get it because that's just the kind of person I am.

The last thing I guess I should tell you, Daddy is this. My life has been cheated and deprived without you in it. I have hated you all I wanted to. I don't have to get revenge for anything you did to me, there's a thing called karma for that. I guess I'm saying that I've hated you so much that I've learned to love to hate you, and that maybe in some twisted way I can learn to hate to love you too.

I must be a worse masochist than I could have ever dreamed.

I often speak about you as if you had died, Daddy. I know one day you will truly die, as we all will. I can only make use of what little time we have left in a positive way. I used to say that I thought your perfect Father's Day gift would be a lifetime of prison for your failures as a father. Such thoughts are only fodder for my generally deranged, train wrecked trail of thought.

A lot of my past troubling experiences were your fault, Daddy. A lot of what I went through and continue to go through will always be your fault, and that will never go away. For the things I did get through, I am a wiser, and a much better person. I am stronger now than I have ever been, so I guess I owe you another thank you for that.

Maybe I'll even take you out to dinner... just for good measure.

Always,

Your Angel.