About My Father

My father came down to visit over the weekend as today is his birthday. I enjoy spending time with my dad but it gets harder every time I see him. For those who do not know, my father is a smoker (anyone who knows me at all well knows how much I abhor this particular habit) and he is an alcoholic. I feel anyone who drinks 12-18 beers on a nightly basis must be classified as an alcoholic. He claims that he "only" drinks 6-8 on weeknights, but since I only see him during weekends and/or vacations, I cannot speak as to the veracity of that statement.

His drinking caused a number of problems throughout my childhood. I don't know how many jobs he actually lost due to drinking, but I do know that I went to three different kindergardens, my family of five lived in a small motor home for awhile, and that I spent 8 months during junior high homeless; we lived in 8 different places during that time, including some campgrounds since it was summertime. I spend much of that time living away from my parents as we were split up staying with friends or people from church at the time. My father lived out of his car for awhile; it was not a pleasant time. It took me years to finally talk about it openly. I imagine most of my friends growing up never even knew. It is hard enough to be 13 without dealing with that kind of crap.

My mother attempted to overcompensate, and I know she meant well, but she was horrendously overprotective and verbally abusive. Anyway, it was not a happy childhood but we always had food and were never hit and I know plenty of people who had it much worse. I managed to excel in school--knowing it was my only way out--and I have mostly put those days behind me. Mostly. Until last night when Luke said something to Jay about wishing that his grampa didn't drink so much. I haven't said anything directly to my son about my father's drinking, but Jay and I have talked about it before so maybe he overheard. I know that he pays attention to things and I suppose this is a wake up call that I need to be mindful of what I say in his presence. Anyway it took me back to my childhood and how much I wished he would stop drinking and be a "normal" dad. I don't know what normal really is, but it can't be living in ~20 homes by age 17 or having nearly every promise broken when you're a child. I remember the smoking, too; he used to smoke a couple packs a day (he has supposedly cut back and is trying to quit, but I can still count and if he's cut back it hasn't been by much) and I came home from elementary school and begged him to stop smoking because we had learned what it does to your body. I flushed his cigarettes down the toilet, but all it did was make him angry.

It bothers me so much that Luke is already becoming aware of his smoking and drinking (he said something about the smoking while we were out at lunch on Saturday when my dad had finished early and gone outside to smoke). But what really bothers me is the fact that I cannot do a damn thing about my father's self-destructive behavior. He is so pleasant and optimistic and he talks about all the places he wants to go and the things he wants to do, and he talks about how much he loves us, but how can he say that when he is doing his damnedest to ensure an early demise? He talks about where he wants to retire and I want to scream at him about how can he possibly think he's going to live to retirement age at the rate he continues to poison his body. The effects of his self-inflicted destruction are becoming apparent; he shakes often and he actually seems drunk now, while he didn't for all those years. He looks older than he really is. It breaks my heart because today is his birthday and I can't help but wonder how many of them can he possibly have left.