THE FATHER THAT I MISSED    

             By Manny Oliva

My father passed away more than two years ago, and when I look back to the past I get to ask myself: “Which one is worse to look back and see those good times together with your father, but you can’t enjoy them anymore because he is gone, or to look back and all the things that you can remember are the sad and the painful memories?”

The coming Father’s Day prompted me to tell about a story that I only kept inside and never had the chance to talk it over with my father; in fact, it has never been told to anybody, not even to my mother or, anyone that I could confide with. The purpose of my writing is not to defile the image of fatherhood in any way, but to give credit to those fathers that have been, painstakingly, sweating blood and tears, just to fulfill the vocation that they dearly embrace as the most important part of their existence. And as a call to those who still have the chance to leave good memories to their children.

I’m in my mid-thirties, but I have never been a father to any children and wedding may still be far for me to consider, but I do have my own personal concept of what a good father is. My fantasy of a father is someone who brings up children who would be good fathers in turn. I think about those times when a father would teach me things I had to learn about surviving in the real world; a father who would be there when I was hurt and helped relieve the pain; a father who would give me security when I was worried and frightened; a father who would be there to give me strength when I was too weak to move on with life’s challenges; a father who would be there to give me advice when I was confused; a father who would be there to help me build my dreams; a father who would be to there to share my thoughts with when I would muse, or just to be able to think that when you got home there was a father who waited for me and always ready to give me a pat on the back and would say, “It’s alright my son, life isn’t that bad.” These are the things that make up my thoughts of what a father I could be and - the father that I missed.

With all the fuss going around for the coming celebration of the Father’s Day, I can’t help but to think also of my father. It should be a day of celebration for children owe their lives to their fathers. The very person whom we can all think as the main pillar of our home that stood sturdily to keep the whole family intact. But it is not the sweet smiles that would fill my heart, but the pain that is deeply buried in my inner being, for I never had the experience of living with those good memories with my father. I wanted to blame him for it, but I have already come to realization that it was not his intention to punish me with such kind of life. I know that fathers only become because of the way they were brought up - the same thing that could have happened to my father, and his father, and even his father’s father before him - the vicious cycle that we all have to go through until we learn from it and find a way to prevent it from happening.

My recounting of the events would start from the time when I left our home and decided to be on my own, bitterly I had to declare my independence! And it happened on October 6th, 1996, a few days after my worst fight with my father. It was Friday night I was packing my things, my mother was knocking at the door of my room, with a bit upset in her voice she asked me why her clothes where scattered on our wooden chair - I used her bag to pack my things. I heard her sobs but she didn’t continue to pry, she could have seen me packing my things through a small opening of my room – she could have guessed that I was packing to leave home. After packing my things, I asked my younger brother to get a taxi. I loaded my things into the taxi, my father was there looking at me from afar without saying anything, but inside I was filled with much anger – I was furious! I was thinking of getting a big piece of a wood to hit him hard in the head for him to feel the pain I had been bearing in my heart since I was young.

Years passed, I lived alone in a small studio-type apartment in West Triangle in Quezon City. Many times in my lonesome, I would think of my family. There were times when tears would drown me because of the heavy load that I had been containing in my fragile being. Until finally, I came to realize that I would be nothing without my parents. I had felt that my being was not complete without my family. And no matter what happened was still my father, something that I couldn’t deny. After more than two years of being away from home, cutting any contact with them, I was led by my feet back home.

It was passed seven in the evening. Our house was quiet. I knocked at our door and called out to my mother. There was no response. I tried to open the door of our house and went up to my mother. I didn’t notice my father was lying there in our living room. My mother got up when she heard my voice and hurried to embrace me as she shed some tears. With excitement, she was calling out to our neighbors to tell them that I was home. I also shed tears as I saw my mother’s pitiful condition – she was sick and bed-ridden. Just after a few minutes of conversation with my mother, I prepared to get back to my apartment, and she told me to, at least, say goodbye to my father, she told me that he had been crying also. It was only then when I noticed him lying in the wooden chair in our living room. Teary eyes he was looking at me. I didn’t say anything to him, just got his hand and place it on my forehead as a sign of peace offering, then I left.
And it was followed with regular visits.

The visit that I never thought would be the last, was the time when my mother called me to tell me that something bad happened to my father, he collapsed in the toilet and couldn’t get up by himself. Friday night, I came to our house with bags of groceries for my family, there I saw my father lying in the wooden sofa. I went to a drugstore to buy medicine for my father. When I came back, he was still lying there in the sofa saying things to himself but was not clear enough to be understood. My mother called to my father to tell him that I brought him medicine and some groceries, but my father didn’t reply but continued talking to himself. After a few minutes, I decided to leave. My mother asked me to stay for the night, but I made some excuses.
I went on with my personal business over the weekend. On Sunday afternoon, as I was having haircut, I felt heaviness in my heart but I couldn’t know the reason. Monday morning, I was having my first class with a foreign student, my mother called to our school. She was crying and broke the news about the death of my father that happened just a day after I visited them, she couldn’t contact me for I didn’t have any cell phone that time. I couldn’t have any response, but just asked where I could see them. The next time I visited my father, he was already cold and lying in a coffin. Thoughts about my father didn’t reel on during the whole period of funeral. I only cried when we were on our way to Chinese cemetery to cremate my father’s body.

A few days after the cremation of my father, I decided to come back home to take care of my mother – “now she’s the only parent I have”, so I thought. And one night as I was fixing the table for our dinner, I was wishing that my father was there and the dinner that I was preparing was for both of them. I wanted to cry but I held back and didn’t tell my mother about it. We have never talked about my father. Our family has never had any conversations about personal and private matters about ourselves, not even when my father was still alive.

Now, I try to look for those good times together with my father, but sadly, I can’t. The only thing I can remember were the times when we went to Luneta Park and Manila Bay to swim. But as we were growing up, things were becoming gloomy for my whole family. We started eating at different time. I started harboring anger against my father, as I felt that he was not being a good father to us. My feeling against my father aggravated when he stopped going to work, and my mother had to take care of the whole family. He was even into gambling that time. My mother’s constant talk about the difficulties she was going through taking care of the whole family made me stopped going to school and find a way to help her – I tried to look for a job. I got one, but instead of being a big help to me, it brought one of my most dreadful experiences in life – I got sexually harassed by my bisexual boss. And everything I had to blame to my father – for it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t have gone through it. So much bitterness I had to bear.

He is gone. I got angry to him. And I harbored the feelings for a long time. And I have learned to forgive and accept his weaknesses as my father. There are times when I would think about the time we could have together; when I would talk to him; when I would buy him something for his birthday and Christmas just like I would do to my mother. But most importantly, the time I would have with him just to have a conversation. I missed having a father in him. I missed being a son to him. How I wish we didn’t have to go through the long and painful experience together. How I wish we also had the good times together just like other fathers and sons, for me to remember by. But we can never have the time, the only thing that is left is the lesson that a father could play a very important role in my life, or any children’s lives.

To fathers who have been striving so hard to fulfill their love to their children you have my respect and admiration, and to the ones who have never taken fatherhood seriously “Please you only got one life-time chance, don’t screw it!” And for those who would be fathers soon, “Congratulation for the chance of a life-time!”.