LJ Idol Season 7; Week 18; Jetsam
While I never really knew much about my father, I am told he was a wonderful man. It’s also said that while he passed from this world while I was still very much a toddler, he is still with me to this day. He’s chosen to make his appearances known when one might least expect it, in unique ways that maybe only I can understand. While some might feel his ghostly presence would be creepy, I find them to be gentle reminders that even though he may not be with me physically, he is still watching over me in one way or another. He wasn’t about to leave his only daughter alone in this cold, cruel world.
He’s even been known to haunt us from time to time.
You see, my dad always knew that he would leave this world too soon. No one can comprehend how he exactly knew it, but he knew he wouldn’t make it past his early 40’s. His main reason for not having children before, and even being part of a couple abortions with ex-girlfriends, was that he hadn’t met a woman that he trusted to take care of hid children after he was gone.
But then, as luck would have it, he met my mom.
She had a daughter, Denice, from a previous marriage, and it was not uncommon to see her choosing her child over the parties and whatnot that other girls her age were into at the time. She doted upon her little girl as if the sun rose and set with her. She was always kept clean and my mom never thought twice to speak up if someone started behaving inappropriately around Denice. He fell in love with my mom, and my mom eventually fell in love back. Apparently it took some coaxing, she wasn’t easily swooned. That was yet another thing that my dad adored about her though. She had class and dignity, she didn’t jump from man to man like his other girlfriends were known to.
My mom swears to this day that they were soul mates.
Of course, I eventually came along. He was there every step of the way through her pregnancy, mood swings and all. He would run out and get her Chinese food at 2 AM if that was what his love was craving that night. He helped pour through baby name books for hours on end. Choosing a name was a rather difficult task since my mom wanted to name me Candace. My dad said “no way!” and when my mom asked why, he said he has seen way too many porn stars named “Candy” for his daughter to have such a name,
So he bought my mom a little lap dog and named her Candy instead. I obviously became known as Kristen.
He was very protective and loving of his little girl from the first day I arrived into this world. He bought me a special piggy bank the day that I was born, its one of the items I treasure to this day. He swore I wouldn’t date until I was 30, and that he would kill any man that ever hurt his little girl. He meant it too.
But while most people agree that he would have done anything in life to protect me, very few people understand that it didn’t stop once his heart stopped beating.
Knowing that he would die young, he told my mom that he wanted her to find love and live a happy and content life without him. He only had one wish. He didn’t want his daughter to be raised by another man. He wanted to be the only person that I called “daddy” and never wanted to be forgotten or replaced.
My mom, assuming it was paranoia from his Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from his time in Vietnam, would try to argue some sense into him. He wouldn’t die young, he would be there to watch me grow up and all that jazz. It never worked, he never believed her. Instead, he asked her to just promise that she wouldn’t let another man replace him as my dad. He promised her that if she did, he would haunt her. My dad was not a man of empty promises, he held tightly to his word in life and planned on keeping his promise long after he went to the grave.
My mom had no other choice but to agree. She meant only to appease him, to help cover up his fears. After all, no one expects to be a widow at such a young age.
But a widow she was. At the ripe young age of 30 years old, my father’s prophecy came true and he passed from this Earth as quickly as I had come into it. My dad was 11 years older than her, but no one will argue that even 41 is still too young to leave this world, especially with a 3 year old daughter that thinks the world of you.
My mother was a heartbroken mess as any person would be at suddenly losing the love of their life. She refused to touch any of his stuff. The armoire that he kept his clothes remained just the way it had been the last day he was alive. His clothes hung neatly side by side, his military uniform hung next to them, still in a plastic protective covering to keep it safe. She kept his wallet exactly as he had, pictures and all and set it inside one of his pants pockets for safe keeping.
We were not allowed to touch his armoire. My mother never opened it herself. It merely sat in her room, a constant reminder that he was there at one point even if he never again came home from work.
But one cannot remain alone forever, especially when you are as young and beautiful as my mom was at the time. She did eventually start dating other people. She even got serious with one. His name was Paul, and eventually I was introduced to him. He would visit often for dinner, and would accompany us to the park. I remember we would take walks around the block and he would swing me from his arms just like my dad used to. Before long, I grew to really like this man.
Marriage was discussed, and in the terms, he asked if he could adopt me. He wanted me to take his last name and for me to call him “dad” since he was incapable of having any children of his own (or so he thought at the time). He wanted us all to have the same last name, to be as one family.
My mom agreed, thus breaking the promise she made to my dad not too long ago.
Paul had left for the night, and Denice and I were fast asleep on the couch from watching cartoons together. My mom was picking up the scattered toys from around us and was just about to carry us to bed when she heard a noise coming from her bedroom. It sounded like things were crashing around in there. We lived on the third floor of an apartment complex, it couldn’t be a burglar, could it?
A quick glance at the TV showed Fluffy fast asleep in his normal position on top of the VCR. It couldn’t be the cat...then what was it?
My mom wearily walked toward her room and opened the door, half expecting to see an intruder that had climbed all the way up to the third floor. However, there was not a soul to be seen. The room felt cold, and the message was out in the open, plain and clear. There was a soul in her bedroom that night, just not one that could be seen with the naked eye.
My dad’s armoire was thrown open, every item inside it was thrown around the room. His military uniform was out of the plastic and lying on her bed. It looked as if someone, in anger, frantically went through his closet and threw everything he had to own around. Odds and ends were thrown all over, as if the armoire itself decided to shed the weight from within by thrusting it out into the room. On top of his uniform was a family photo from his wallet, specifically pulled out and neatly placed on top of his uniform. It was of his little family, one of the few photos that I have with all of us in it.
All of this was an eerie reminder to my mother of a promise she made, and one she was about to break. Do promises made in life really carry on after death? She wasn’t one who would normally think so...but the evidence was the mess lying all over her room.
My dad was an honest man who always was true to his word. Apparently some things don’t change after you die. He kept to his word that he would haunt my mother if she broke the promise she made during a time when she thought her life would never take such a dramatic turn. Seeing the message before her, she felt as if she had no other choice but to compromise.
My mom dropped all talk of Paul claiming me. They are still together, but in all the years that he has been in my life, I have never once called him dad. After all, there is only one person who deserves such a title in my life.
Even if he isn’t physically here to watch me grow up or offer me guidance, I know that in spirit, he is with me every single day. When I was a teen girl and crying myself to sleep, contemplating how I wanted to die...he was there. I’d feel his presence, I could feel his his arms around me as he comforted me to sleep. He has made himself known when I needed it the most, and to me, that’s all that matters. No man will ever replace my dad.
He’s even been known to haunt us from time to time.
You see, my dad always knew that he would leave this world too soon. No one can comprehend how he exactly knew it, but he knew he wouldn’t make it past his early 40’s. His main reason for not having children before, and even being part of a couple abortions with ex-girlfriends, was that he hadn’t met a woman that he trusted to take care of hid children after he was gone.
But then, as luck would have it, he met my mom.
She had a daughter, Denice, from a previous marriage, and it was not uncommon to see her choosing her child over the parties and whatnot that other girls her age were into at the time. She doted upon her little girl as if the sun rose and set with her. She was always kept clean and my mom never thought twice to speak up if someone started behaving inappropriately around Denice. He fell in love with my mom, and my mom eventually fell in love back. Apparently it took some coaxing, she wasn’t easily swooned. That was yet another thing that my dad adored about her though. She had class and dignity, she didn’t jump from man to man like his other girlfriends were known to.
My mom swears to this day that they were soul mates.
Of course, I eventually came along. He was there every step of the way through her pregnancy, mood swings and all. He would run out and get her Chinese food at 2 AM if that was what his love was craving that night. He helped pour through baby name books for hours on end. Choosing a name was a rather difficult task since my mom wanted to name me Candace. My dad said “no way!” and when my mom asked why, he said he has seen way too many porn stars named “Candy” for his daughter to have such a name,
So he bought my mom a little lap dog and named her Candy instead. I obviously became known as Kristen.
He was very protective and loving of his little girl from the first day I arrived into this world. He bought me a special piggy bank the day that I was born, its one of the items I treasure to this day. He swore I wouldn’t date until I was 30, and that he would kill any man that ever hurt his little girl. He meant it too.
But while most people agree that he would have done anything in life to protect me, very few people understand that it didn’t stop once his heart stopped beating.
Knowing that he would die young, he told my mom that he wanted her to find love and live a happy and content life without him. He only had one wish. He didn’t want his daughter to be raised by another man. He wanted to be the only person that I called “daddy” and never wanted to be forgotten or replaced.
My mom, assuming it was paranoia from his Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from his time in Vietnam, would try to argue some sense into him. He wouldn’t die young, he would be there to watch me grow up and all that jazz. It never worked, he never believed her. Instead, he asked her to just promise that she wouldn’t let another man replace him as my dad. He promised her that if she did, he would haunt her. My dad was not a man of empty promises, he held tightly to his word in life and planned on keeping his promise long after he went to the grave.
My mom had no other choice but to agree. She meant only to appease him, to help cover up his fears. After all, no one expects to be a widow at such a young age.
But a widow she was. At the ripe young age of 30 years old, my father’s prophecy came true and he passed from this Earth as quickly as I had come into it. My dad was 11 years older than her, but no one will argue that even 41 is still too young to leave this world, especially with a 3 year old daughter that thinks the world of you.
My mother was a heartbroken mess as any person would be at suddenly losing the love of their life. She refused to touch any of his stuff. The armoire that he kept his clothes remained just the way it had been the last day he was alive. His clothes hung neatly side by side, his military uniform hung next to them, still in a plastic protective covering to keep it safe. She kept his wallet exactly as he had, pictures and all and set it inside one of his pants pockets for safe keeping.
We were not allowed to touch his armoire. My mother never opened it herself. It merely sat in her room, a constant reminder that he was there at one point even if he never again came home from work.
But one cannot remain alone forever, especially when you are as young and beautiful as my mom was at the time. She did eventually start dating other people. She even got serious with one. His name was Paul, and eventually I was introduced to him. He would visit often for dinner, and would accompany us to the park. I remember we would take walks around the block and he would swing me from his arms just like my dad used to. Before long, I grew to really like this man.
Marriage was discussed, and in the terms, he asked if he could adopt me. He wanted me to take his last name and for me to call him “dad” since he was incapable of having any children of his own (or so he thought at the time). He wanted us all to have the same last name, to be as one family.
My mom agreed, thus breaking the promise she made to my dad not too long ago.
Paul had left for the night, and Denice and I were fast asleep on the couch from watching cartoons together. My mom was picking up the scattered toys from around us and was just about to carry us to bed when she heard a noise coming from her bedroom. It sounded like things were crashing around in there. We lived on the third floor of an apartment complex, it couldn’t be a burglar, could it?
A quick glance at the TV showed Fluffy fast asleep in his normal position on top of the VCR. It couldn’t be the cat...then what was it?
My mom wearily walked toward her room and opened the door, half expecting to see an intruder that had climbed all the way up to the third floor. However, there was not a soul to be seen. The room felt cold, and the message was out in the open, plain and clear. There was a soul in her bedroom that night, just not one that could be seen with the naked eye.
My dad’s armoire was thrown open, every item inside it was thrown around the room. His military uniform was out of the plastic and lying on her bed. It looked as if someone, in anger, frantically went through his closet and threw everything he had to own around. Odds and ends were thrown all over, as if the armoire itself decided to shed the weight from within by thrusting it out into the room. On top of his uniform was a family photo from his wallet, specifically pulled out and neatly placed on top of his uniform. It was of his little family, one of the few photos that I have with all of us in it.
All of this was an eerie reminder to my mother of a promise she made, and one she was about to break. Do promises made in life really carry on after death? She wasn’t one who would normally think so...but the evidence was the mess lying all over her room.
My dad was an honest man who always was true to his word. Apparently some things don’t change after you die. He kept to his word that he would haunt my mother if she broke the promise she made during a time when she thought her life would never take such a dramatic turn. Seeing the message before her, she felt as if she had no other choice but to compromise.
My mom dropped all talk of Paul claiming me. They are still together, but in all the years that he has been in my life, I have never once called him dad. After all, there is only one person who deserves such a title in my life.
Even if he isn’t physically here to watch me grow up or offer me guidance, I know that in spirit, he is with me every single day. When I was a teen girl and crying myself to sleep, contemplating how I wanted to die...he was there. I’d feel his presence, I could feel his his arms around me as he comforted me to sleep. He has made himself known when I needed it the most, and to me, that’s all that matters. No man will ever replace my dad.