My Father as you all know, has just re entered my life 15 months ago. After a very long 22 years. I am simply amazed at how alike we are. I remember the first time I heard his voice on the phone. I was utterly speechless. And not for a couple of seconds but a few minutes. Crissy, honey....its your dad. This moment will NEVER leave my mind. I remembered his voice. It was like I had never stopped hearing it. I was in total and complete shock to hear him at the other end. My dad. I have a dad. We were on the phone for 2 1/2 the first time speaking, and then was here the very next morning.
I opened the door and this man with Grey hair, my height, my eye color opened the car door and made his way up our stoop. I was so happy and yet so sad. Where did my dad go? He had a beard and his face has wrinkles. I thought back quickly to the man I once remembered. He had dark hair and always wore jeans and cowboy boots. He was a good looking man, he reminded me of Dean martin. But he is old now. I could tell he had problems with his knees. He was having slight trouble getting up the stairs.
We hugged and I cried, and cried. All these thoughts were consuming my mind. I was so angry that I got ripped off. I missed 22 years of his life. I never got to see the progression of him getting older. I missed literally everything in his life. and vice versa. I wish that I cold fully explain how this made me feel, but it is hard. My dad missed so much. My weddings, the birth of my children. Seeing me graduate, seeing me grow into a women. He didn't know anything about me. who I dated, who my friends were, what jobs I have had. NOTHING! this was hard. He sat on the couch next to me, and I could not stop staring at him. He was so handsome. He was my dad. We look a lot alike. Skin tone. We have the same shape hands and feet ( short and stubby) We have the same color of eyes and we are the same height. We are both sarcastic and share the same sense of humor. We are both stubborn and hard workers. I am so glad that I can finally say that I am like someone. I grew up with my mom. Who I am completely opposite then. We look and act nothing alike. And the BOOM. I take one look at my dad and know that I am his. I finally feel like I belong somewhere.
But when my dad left.....I could not stop crying. All I wanted was for him to be close. I didn't want to be apart from him. I still don't. I honestly can say that I cry every time he leaves. It breaks my heart. At the beginning though I was sacred. I thought that he was going to leave and not come back, like what I was used to when I was little. I hate so much seeing him leave. I would give anything for us to live down the road from one another.
We have to learn to blend our lives together and this is oh so very hard. We all have our own friends and lives that never included one another and now all of a sudden we have to figure out how to incorporate visits and holidays and phone calls etc. You may think its easy. But nope. My dad and brother and older sister live 2 hours away and my little sister 4 hours away. I just started my own company, I am very involved in our church. I have two children and a husband. I have a life that never included all of these people. What a drastic change. I do have to admit. the first couple of months after finding my dad. I wished that I didn't have my family. I wanted to just go live with my dad. Something that I never had the chance to do. I wanted to be his little girl again.
So that's my struggle today....Wanting my daddy closer to me.
