Urinalysis, Mr. Spock?
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I have a collect call from an inmate at the San Luis Obispo County Jail.
If I want to hear the maximum charge for this call, I should press 'nine' now.
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There is a plastic jar in the trashcan in my bathroom left behind by my daughter's probation officer from her piss test.
I guess she peed clean.
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I got no idea what I did wrong with her.
I really tried to be a good daddy. I read her bedtime stories. I taught her right from wrong. I held her hand and walked her to school for years and years. I went out in the world and tried to do good, and then I came home and tried to be even better.
It wasn't no use.
She spits on it. Ever bit of it.
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I don't cotton to it.
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On the one hand I am attempting to dissassemble the framework, apprehend things as they are. On the other hand, I probably can't apprehend anything at all without the framework, so where's that getting me?
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I am a broken toy.
As are we all of us.
As are we all.
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posted by tearful dishwasher at 10:02 PM
6 Comments:
If you had to like EVERY part of me, you wouldn't like me... and I, you... or anyone, or most any THING, I suppose. But if we can find one (one!) thing to like, and focus on, we can get along.
Until the damn monkey yanks the freaking knobs off. Personally, some things need LESS apprehension/comprehension to leave me in a place where I can deal with it... I save discovery to that which can bear it, or which I can bear. Both, really.
But that doesn't seem to be your nature.
And I don't have a kid, so that may all be BS in your case.
Sometimes it's just better to keep your periscope down and make peach cobbler.
Glad your typing about it, anyway.
give it a couple more years, scott. next time around, it'll be her trying to patch up your own outlaw soul.
i'm not a comment person. this would be a better email, but i can't find yours.
first, your wife is so beautiful. your daughter is beautiful too. i was looking at your wife's blog.
also, i like all the art and good food in your life.
my mom and dad raised six kids. they never beat us or practiced any sort of weirdness on us. no one suffered. everyone was loved. four have been arrested. two have done some time. every one of us is so different. all the good is different and all the bad. people who know my parents can't figure out the bad in their kids at all. it makes no sense.
and they have suffered through and because of their children. it has never been fair and sometimes it makes me very angry, because i know my folks are good, good people. trying from the get-go to do the right thing. honestly selfless in their actions if not in their hearts.
and they've always had each other. aside from you and your yolie, i see love between my parents.
there is no end to this story. some things get better and some things seem less bad. everyone is still alive and tiny improvements have been made, although there is damage.
i don't know scott. you know. it all just keeps going. the life. there is love and wishing and forgiveness. life is so strange, and, at times, so beautiful.
keep hope. there is no reason not to.
I have passed on a "Premio Dardos" award to you -- more info on my blog.
--T.
Folks are correct about riding it out. My most prized possession in this world is a letter my daughter wrote me a couple of years ago (when she was 22) apologizing for all the stuff she did. And her stuff wasn't just the normal teen stuff; she pulled out the stops. While the apology didn't erase the years of pain and fear, it did help to make them just a little softer, a bit less in-focus.
I wish you all the best.
Just think about the kids whose dads don't give a damn.
Think of the dads that don't try to be good daddies.
Or, think about the kids that have no dads at all.
Seriously, dude, all you can do is try. You can't blame yourself for how she turned or turns out anymore than she can blame you, if she tries.
She's her own person. Despite everything, you've got to respect the hell out of that.
Not that any of this is what you want to hear or read.
But seriously, dude, were any of us perfect children?
For those of us (not me) who are brave enough to cross over to the other side and try on the whole parenting end of things, are any of us perfect parents?
God, I hope not.
Sure, she'll drive you crazy. Sure, you'll stay up nights worrying yourself sick about her. But in the end, down the road a ways, it'll all work out. You'll meet each other halfway someday.
My father and I were trying to figure out how to talk to each other, how to reconcile the silence and misunderstanding between us when he died.
It is what is is, Scott.
And what is is is never perfect.
You and your daughter will meet each other halfway someday.
I promise.
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