Essays on Reclamation, Identity, Enjoyment, Belonging, Art, Nature, Beauty, Food, or whatever I’m really interested in.

**Language warning. **

Episode Title: “Fair-Weather Father.” Mark.

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Fair-Weather Father.

Mark

You don’t ever think it’s the end, do you?
My family’s Irish Catholic.
Well, my mother was, my father looked
like a Viking, and apparently, 10, 11 generations up,
on my father’s, mother’s, side there’s a Danish great, great—
a lot of greats— grandfather,
who was Dutch, lived in England, then Holland, then
England again, then, apparently,— though there’s a lot of lore, and legend,
in my family, came over on the
Mayflower, or some shit. But, look, there have been
Methodists, Baptists, Lutherans, and you know what I say to my
mother, and to my uncles? Whatever you think will
help, that’s what. You love— I mean, I don’t know, the point is that… I hear it,
And that’s your way of doing it for me. I hear that that’s your
way of being here for me. But my brother sitting with me
in the fishing boat,
on Sunday, and letting me take
credit for the big king catch,
that, somehow, is something I feel is going to be right
there with me, you know…and
telling me all these stories, I mean,
stories that aren’t appropriate for this, but
that he said,
I’m always going to tell that story… and I don’t know, it didn’t
make me less afraid, but it made me something…. But my son and daughter, they don’t talk to me. A bunch of stuff that happened between
their mom and me, they took personally, and I don’t know… but how good my son and daughter had
it, I mean, their mom and I, we couldn’t stay together, but they don’t
know how good they even had it… My grandson’s game,
they say, is today, but I mean, what do you do, do I go there and cause a scene?
Do I hope they just show up one day? I mean, I don’t have one day, but
I mean, at the end,
go banging on my son’s door,
when he has guests, so he can’t
ignore me, or sit on
my daughter’s doorstep, sleet, or snow,
until she has to let me in.
You’re trying to make them understand, right, the world isn’t that easy, the world doesn’t
give a shit about you,
the world is not butterflies, and bunnies, and aw sit here, tell
me all about it, about what you want to be when you grow up,
The world lulls you, and smacks you,
and grinds you, and you’re lucky if, when you wake up every day, you still
want to
live at all because sometimes it
feels like, it is just—(a grind of bullshit that is) trying to kill you. Though, at this point,
I guess, it’s not going to
get
to wait that long. You know how old I was when I got married?
21. You know how young that is? It’s, basically, non-existent. Had him when I was 22, her when I was 25, which, at least,— but still, I was a moron… The wrong
age, the wrong girl, the wrong time… Got a great girl now, but I hear her in the middle of the night, crying on the pullout, in the guestroom, where she thinks, I can’t
hear her… a few
good good years, shitstorm lands again…But I can’t leave it like
this…
What kind of — Know
what my son
said, Never going to be a fair-weather father like you, put my son
through what you put me through,
Wasn’t ever any, I’ll tell you, I’ll tell you, wasn’t ever any weather I was in, that was fair.
12 now minutes left in my grandson’s game,
and I am here with you,
I was headed there, but, I mean, you know, what it is— I can’t leave another mess.
I just need it in order, you know, that it’s nothing extra

going ‘til the last and fighting ‘til the last,
but if I can’t,

If it’s all gone to shit,
And it’s come out of nowhere,
would have had to come out of nowhere,
‘cept for this last 11 months of bullshit,
but if it comes to it, and you gotta make the call,
or it would be …be Gloria that would have to make the call,
I just need them to know it’s not going to be anything extra
I don’t want it
Gloria
Gloria’d probably be the one to make the call
but she’ll be —
really Nance that should tell ‘em, really, but like I said, the kid’s not talking to me
so it’s gotta be in writing
and it’s gotta be clear
and that’s gotta be it
that’s got to be it and that’s all. I already pulled out every extraordinary measure I know.
So, if I’m ever not me, and then I’m gone.
and it’s all beeping and tubes
I mean, my dad.
No kid should ever have to see their father like that.
So if there’s ever a man lying in that bed and it’s not me anymore,
then that’s it, you know what I mean,
They’re gonna have to let me go.
could be, it’s better that kid know me in whatever they, whatever it is they’re gonna tell him about me,
but by that time… that it…
that’s it,
you know, they’re gonna have to let me go.

 

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