Thanksgiving Intentions

Dad Thanksgiving 04 The Black Angel, Dad, and my Sister Flea


Don't we always have good intentions?

I intended to be well-rested this Thanksgiving...but due to my Children Who Must Not Be Named and a crisis of faith with their father...I went to bed at 3 a.m. But damn, it was worth it! The Unnamed Others are male and as such, rarely emote.

Whatever is going on inside those brains and hearts remains unspoken...Until something provokes them to the point of exploding and then I hear it all. They are angry at their father for basically not listening to them, treating them like second class citizens instead of family members and trying to control them.

Welcome to my ex-world, but I do not say this.

Instead we talk for hours about how they intend to handle things. The Eldest says he gave his dad a book to read that explains his philosophy. The Tao Te Ching. He talks about how you do not preach your philosophy, you instead live if. If others are interested, they will follow. It is about letting go of trying to control others and centering your own reality, he says.

I say, "We create our own realities," and the Eldest says, "How do you know that?"

Like he is the first person in the universe to discover these facts and is shocked that an old fart like his mother could know of such amazing things! I say, "Your grandfather taught me this."

"I knew it! I knew it was familiar! It's grandaddy!"

We talk on into the night about his grandfather and what he has learned from him. About love. About the importance of family. And finally about his father and how my eldest intends to have lunch with him and present him with ways to see the problem between them as a shared responsibility and not the fault of the child. He says to lose his cool and be angry is non-productive. He had done this part already and it is time to move forward, he says.

I am blown away. I am amazed that a child with such wisdom came from me.

It is one of those rare talks you have with your children in which you know you will always remember this particular moment and that your child will remember it also. In that way, you always live on, in them.

Of course, this is not our first momentous talk. I remember another one, shortly after I separated from their father. Somehow we got down to the brass tacks of the birds and the bees and how human beings procreate.

To this day, my youngest remembers that talk. "Oh, my God! That's how my bed got broken? My aunt and uncle were doing "it" in my bed? Oh, gross! Throw it out!"

This comes after the eldest has said he already knows all about sex. "You put your penis up the girl's butt," he says confidently.

Not without lube and permission, I think, and struggle to keep a straight face.

The youngest says, "You mean you had sex with dad after you had us?" He is completely shocked. "I thought the man did it to the girl and then he died!"

The Eldest looks at his brother with great disdain. "Stupid, that's spiders not people! Besides, if Dad died after he got Mom pregnant, how would you be here?"

"Oh," the Youngest Unnamed One says.

These are talks we will always remember. They are pivot points in our path and will always be regarded as sign posts and mile markers along life's journey.

Today I am bleary-eyed and stupid. I try to clean the house, do the laundry and prepare for Thanksgiving at our house...but it is a fragmented preparation. I do one thing here, another over there, forget I was doing one thing and start another.

I am not having fun. If I were having fun there would be laughing. I would be having a glass of wine and talking with someone. The time would fly by.

Which is when I remember that someone would have been my father and this is my first holiday without him.

Tomorrow my Sister Flea comes in with the Black Angel. I am terribly afraid we will look into each others eyes and see the same thing...the grief and recognition that this is our first Thanksgiving without The Wisest Man in the Universe.

I am afraid we will dissolve like sugar into boiling water and become one big puddle of grief. I am afraid I will cry and cry and not be able to pull it off for the kids and our friends.

But I also know I am my father's daughter. If I have one-tenth of his courage and wisdom, I'll make it. We'll all make it.