Butterfly Kisses

Me in Berkeley letting my Dad's sadness go

For most of my life, I've been carrying around this profound sadness surrounding my father. The first, and longest to date, phase of it was sadness for him -- worrying about why he was unhappy, feeling sorry for him because of what he went through as a child and/or was going through as an adult. The second phase was sadness for myself (this didn't come until my 30s and my entrance into Alanon) -- at first that I hadn't had a father capable of being emotionally connected, and then that I had a father whose alcoholism wrought the kind of abuse that made accessing real (romantic) love impossible until I had done years of healing work. Most recently, upon visiting his childhood home, I realized there was an additional layer: I was carrying his sadness. I guess because I thought then he wouldn't have to? It hasn't worked that way though, and I know now it doesn't work that way.

So here I am now, 45 years old, on the anniversary of his birth (today), with a nasty cough that one of my healer peeps says is probably related to unexpressed grief, but I don't really feel sadness.

Not even when I listen to a song like this, which used to make me feel so acutely what I've missed out on in this life:

There's two things I know for sure
She was sent here from heaven,
And she's daddy's little girl.
As I drop to my knees by her bed at night,
She talks to Jesus, and I close my eyes.
And I thank god for all of the joy in
My life, but most of all, for

Butterfly kisses after bedtime prayer.
Stickin' little white flowers all up in her hair.
"Walk beside the pony
Daddy, it's my first ride."
"I know the cake looks funny,
Daddy, but I sure tried."
Oh, with all that I've done wrong,
I must have done something right
To deserve a hug every morning,
And butterfly kisses at night.

Sweet sixteen today,
She's looking like her mamma
A little more every day.
One part woman, the other part girl.
To perfume and makeup,
From ribbons and curls.
Trying her wings out in a great
Big world. but I remember

Butterfly kisses after bedtime prayer.
Stickin' little white flowers all up in her hair.
"You know how much I love you daddy,
But if you don't mind,
I'm only gonna kiss you on the cheek this time."
Oh with all that I've done wrong,
I must have done something right.
To deserve her love every morning,
And butterfly kisses at night.

All the precious time
Ohhh like the wind, when the years go by
Precious butterfly
Spread your wings and fly

She'll change her name today.
She'll make a promise,
And I'll give her away.
Standing in the bride room
Just staring at her,
She asked me what I'm thinking,
And I said "I'm not sure,
I just feel like I'm losing my baby girl."
Then she leaned over and gave me

Butterfly kisses, with her mama there
Sticking little white flowers all up in her hair
"Walk me down the aisle daddy, it's just
About time"
"Does my wedding gown look pretty Daddy?"
"Daddy don't cry"
Oh with all that I've done wrong,
I must have done something right
To deserve her love every morning,
And butterfly kisses
I couldn't ask god for more, man, this is
What love is
I know I've gotta let her go, but I'll always
Remember
Every hug in the morning, and butterfly kisses

This, to say the least, was not my experience. My sister reminded me the other day that our father once proclaimed how much better his life got when we left home. I mentioned that to my boyfriend the other day, and he said: "It probably did." And I knew he was right -- that this is just the truth of who my father is -- that what he wants is peace and quiet -- not connection with his children. I feel the exact opposite. My connection with my children is the single greatest gift of my life, and I have a pretty great connection with my boyfriend. It's not that something is lacking there, it is that the love between parents and children, at least for me, is the most profound. But it wasn't, it isn't for my father; I realize he was born during a time when the choice to be a parent was seldom made consciously, and if he had been, I don't think I would be here.

And I'm soooo grateful that I'm here. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to be present to and connected with my own children. I'm so grateful for the opportunity to fully love a man, heart, soul, mind, body. It may have taken approximately half my life and tens of thousands of hours and dollars, but I'm here. And I'm grateful...

Hero

I had a really rough day at work, and throughout my day there seemed to be a number of people who didn't have the time or the consideration to understand my point of view. I did my best to speak my truth, and while that's something I can feel proud of myself for, there was no getting away from the discomfort.

After work, I tried to deal with it as productively as I could. I stopped myself from going too far down the road of lamenting that I wasn't heading home to a supportive partner. Nope, I told myself, that's not part of today's experience. I cried. I talked to a friend. I did the things I needed to do to take care of my children. And I thought about how to talk to them about how I was feeling.

I decided to go with explaining how I felt about what had happened. They empathized. My daughter said that she thought one thing that would be hard about having kids is even when you have a bad day, you still have to take care of them. She really gets it, and I appreciated her nailing how I was feeling. I told them if they didn't mind, after dinner, I was going to try to just kind of take the night off.

I ended up watching a movie I read about in the New Yorker a while back: Boyhood. It's incredible. It's shot over a period of like 10 years as the actors grew up. It's not easy to watch at times -- there are some abusive alcoholic scenes that are very tense. But overall, it's a pretty beautiful story about how life doesn't necessarily work out the way you want it to or think it will. And the best you can do is to be true to yourself, love your people as well as you can, and enjoy the ride.

This is one of the main songs from the movie:

Let me go
I don't wanna be your hero
I don't wanna be your big man
I just wanna fight with everyone else

Your masquerade
I don't wanna be a part of your parade
Everyone deserves a chance to
Walk with everyone else

While holding down
A job to keep my girl around
And maybe buy me some new strings
And her a night out on the weekend

And we can whisper things
Secrets from our American dreams
Baby needs some protection
But I'm a kid like everyone else

So let me go
I don't wanna be your hero
I don't wanna be your big man
I just wanna fight like everyone else

And it feels like a pretty good song to mark this tough day, a day that, as many do, is pushing me to figure out how to be true to myself so that I can both enjoy my own life as much as possible and set the best possible example for my children...