Monday, June 20, 2011

Dying to the Fat-her and finding Dad

Was just reading a fellow wanderer with the Dude.. and she was musing on the difference between Father and Dad..  This being the first year in not being with my kids on Fathers day did get me to thinkin (and that could be trouble).

My fellow blogger calls many things Sacred Shite.. as would I.. she muses on patriarchial tendancies of culture and feminist agendas.. an odd time to be a Dad indeed this.. yes, with absentee, caretaker, steps.. and many other types.. the gender fules are fusing, synthesizing.. into just what..  that's for time to tell..  With so many divorces and many adapting to the new milenium where things are much more integrated with these things.. gone is the day where we actually are shocked at divorce and seperation.. much like ancient tribes we are finding new identities and touchstones.. new ways to express and feel our joys, pains, and connections..

Though my own experience of having a father was not positive to say the least.. there was no revelry nor highlights.. only dark spots.. and mysteries.. surrounded in a shroud of human fallability.. that's what I see at least looking back..

Are theres a tinge of remorse, regret, anger, and bitterness.. maybe.. but I really feel that there has been a kind of reprieve in my own becoming a Dad.. and I can only hope that others who have had similiar experiences as I will find at the very least that..

I do know that we need to at least try to work through our issues and scars..

to make the manure into something to grow something better, hopefully much better..

We may have to put on hold our ideals.. be a bit cathartic at times.. but we can relate.. we can attempt to support, comfort, and be there.. be more, be better.. and then in the exchange find something for ourselves too..

Though my parents seperated before I can remember..  at about 2 years old.. and My step dad who came in at about 3.. I stopped relating to as any kind of Father at 5.. and so no longer called as such.. I feel a strange echo in the Jewish and Christian scriptures that talk of a Divine Dad coming into the picture..   The working out of that relation has stayed with me many years now..  Though there are some very interesting things with the very real exchange I feel I've had with this distinct personality.. I'm not sure I would be ready to call Him Father..  although that might be just how I see things..

Dad, might just fit though.. cause well.. as i've found being one.. it's a continuing process .. an evolving relationship with not only my children but myself and the world at large.. and their interaction too.. and what they find..   it involves a fallability.. something I see in the figure that walked and stumbled to an unearned "crucifiction"  ..  to appearances it seems that the Dude, the Divine.. doesn't really care all that much for the Perceptual piece or program that many organizations do..  But we dad's do find ourselves continually feeling like we have to give in.. if we care..

as we translate our humanity, or rather extend it.. we find that relation.. we see connection.. and we laugh, cry, and fall asleep... So I guess a Dad's travail is that of what the whole of life is striving after.. meaning, pleasure, contentment.. some call that success.. some call other things it..