My Father

Let me bring you into my world…

Show you why I am the way I am.

Scottsdale, AZ near West World on Frank Lloyd Wright and the 101…

We sat on my father’s balcony…

“What’s wrong with you my son?”

I stared into the eyes of the man who’s caused me and almost every single member of my family so much pain over the past few years.

My nephew Tony was sitting right next to me, and I was playing out in my head how I wanted this to go down.

There was option A which was to give my father an earful right in front of his grandson, tell him how much of a fuck up he is, and make sure he understands that he should be ashamed of himself…

But option A felt too emotional to me, that’s not how an alpha conducts himself in the world, it’s calm cool collected always.

I gave my nephew my keys and told him to go to my car, he just responded okay and left the balcony to just me and my father sitting across from each other.

The sliding door closed and I sat there, looking at him puffing his cigar.

“I asked you, what’s wrong with you my son?”

The silence filled the air as I calculated the next words I was going to say.

I first met my nephew when I was maybe 6 or 7 years old, and he was maybe 2 or 3, but I never saw him after that, and I never knew what happened to him mainly because his mother, my half-sister, cut off all communication with us.

But here we are 16 years later, and he decided he wants to drive across the country to come meet his other side of the family.

He’s skinny, plays video games all the time, doesn’t really groom himself, and wears clothes that are a little too small for him.

Standard 18-year-old shit, he doesn’t really understand the real world yet.

I was happy to have him come stay with me for a bit so he could see an image of what having your shit together looks like.

There’s work, working out, relaxation, learning, closing deals, talking to women, seeing women, talking to friends, and church. That’s pretty much it. Oh, and my husky Czar too.

And yesterday, I decided it would be nice for him to go see his grandfather, the man who did such a fantastic job of raising me.

(Sarcasm intended.)

I figured, “My dad can have his shit together for one night, right? He may say some crazy shit but how bad can it be? I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

Oh boy, how wrong was I…

We planned everything out the day before, and I even let him know an hour ahead of time that we were coming.

So we showed up at his place, and this man is black-out drunk answering the door without a shirt on because he just woke up from a drunk nap.

He can barely stand up straight…

He can hardly say a sentence that’s more than 4 words…

He doesn't make any sense at all…

Outstanding.

So we go outside to his balcony, and my dad sits down and says “I talked to your sister” as he starts to light his cigar.

I reply, “What did you say to her?”

He says nothing and continues to light his cigar.

There’s another 60 seconds of dead air as he just struggles to light his cigar, spitting out tobacco that was loose on the butt.

“What did you say to her?”

Again, silence.

He just stares at his grandson.

“Papa.”

“Ah what?”

“What did you say to Jacqueline?”

“Well I invited her to come have dinner with us, but she clearly doesn’t care about seeing your nephew here, she’s too busy with work.”

“When did you tell her to come over?”

“A few hours ago.”

“She can’t cancel on the day of her shift, that’s not how her job works.”

“Is it that important?”

“Yes, she’d lose her job.”

“Oh.”

He smiled like an idiot and that’s when I think all levels of consideration and acceptance left my frame entirely.

My eyebrows were lowered, there was no emotion in my eyes, I know the look.

I’ve given it to myself in the mirror hundreds of times.

“What’s wrong with you my son?”

And that’s when I gave my nephew the keys and told him to go to my car.

I’ll tell you what’s wrong with your son.

Once it was just him and I, the stare kept going.

I want you to feel uncomfortable.

He just kept looking back.

“The one time your grandson comes to see you and this is how you show up, completely drunk. You couldn’t not drink for just one day.”

He kept looking at me, he wanted me to yell at him, he wanted me to lose my cool, he feeds off that sort of energy.

So I just got up and left.

“Where are you going?”

You don’t deserve a response.

I got into the car with my nephew and we left the parking lot of his condo complex…

“Buddy, I’m sorry that I couldn’t show you the good side of your grandpa, you got to see his worst side. But I’m telling you dude, that right there…that’s what’s at the tail end of 50+ years of fucking off and ignoring the responsibilities you have as a man.”

My nephew sat there with a look on his face that made me realize this was a lot for him, but that’s okay, real life and the real world are a lot.

“I know right now you’re 18, life is just fun, you don’t really care about anything. It’s acceptable when you’re 18. But truthfully, you need to start now, the longer you wait, the harder it’s going to be for you to get your shit together.”

“What you just saw right there, this is why I am who I am. I refuse to fuck my life up like that, I refuse to ever show up like my future kids for that. I’ve gone to extreme lengths to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

I let the silence fill the air as I called my mom who lives about 10 minutes down the road to let her know we were coming over.

I took my nephew to what a stable household looks like.

I showed him what a truly masculine man (my stepfather) looks and acts like.

I showed him what a healthy dynamic in a relationship looks like and how it helps create an enjoyable peaceful household.

I’m not sure how much of this he’s going to absorb and take on in his life, I hope some of it sticks and he makes the right decisions.

The best thing I can do is show this kid what life looks like when we do find meaning in our life and take care of our responsibilities…

And then what life looks like if we ignore everything and become a living example of ignorance.

I showed him what my life looked like for 18 years straight.

Back and forth between chaos and order during the week and weekends.

And this is why I am who I am.