A Father’s Tears
Busy airport.
The time was 13:45, and people would just walk around from one side to another of the terminal. Some looking for food, others trying to check their bags, others just living the mundane busy life we got used to.
And there he was, in silence, alone, in a corner table just staring at his phone.
Messages just kept popping at the screen. Anxiety made an appearance. Heavy breathing. And after a few minutes of watery eyes, finally, a tear rolled down his cheek.
In a desperate move, without being able to even breathe the right way for a second, he took his computer out of his backpack, and started writing at his favorite word processor.
He thought to himself,
“I need to write this down, I need to let him know the whole story, the nuances, the complete details, the real feelings second by second…”
He stopped the thought process.
His face was that of a realization. That of a man with no escape, no hope. He closed his eyes, tears coming down like leafs during autumn, each one of them fragile and colorless.
He opened his eyes, and started writing a letter.
The letter was for his son. This is what that letter said.
Dear son:
I’m out of words right now. I know you expect me to explain every detail, to answer every single one of your questions. I’m aware of the high pedestal you have put me on, completely undeserved of course. Here’s a truth to shock your entire world:
I’m only a human, only a kid like you, with responsibilities and a beard.
I would like to tell you the story. I would like to tell you everything I felt at each turn.
I would like you to understand the reasons. This is impossible. This truth breaks me into pieces. I will never be able to put you on my shoes, at every second of the journey.
This means that is up to you to fill in the blanks of such an intricate and confusing story. To many details get lost. And you’ll have to fill in those spaces.
Such a responsibility should be mine and mine alone. At your age, you will fail to fill in those blanks, fill in the details.
I will be forever in debt to you, because I gave you such a burden to carry.
I would like to tell you that what your mind thinks is right, is not even close to reality. I would like to make you understand that the path you’re taking only leads to pain and suffering.
How do I know this?
Because I’ve tried. I’ve tried to tell you the story.
You will only see, what you want to see. Because you don’t see things through my perspective. If I could show you how everything is from this side of the garden, you might have a chance to understand my ways.
But even that wouldn’t be enough. For my ways are not the ways of the world.
My decisions are not based on societies standards.
You will learn in time, that everything you’ve told me was completely misguided by different variables. And that you only dared to ask a real question when I suggested it. You had already answered the questions yourself.
And the reality is, that you didn’t care about the truth.
Life will teach you that to judge is to lose sight of your own path. You told me you don’t want to be like me when you grow older. You don’t have to. That is the point. You have to be you, you have to forge your ways. You have to find you answers.
I just hope you are fit to see those lessons when the time comes.
By then, I might not be around anymore.
There are a lot of things you can’t see from where you currently are. And that will always be in between you and me.
If only you could see everything I’ve done since I met you only for the wellbeing of your life and happiness. If only you could see what I’m risking. I don’t ask for recognition, I’m way past that in my life. But I genuinely think you would see things differently.
I’m not the father you want, I’m aware of it. I will only be the father you need at the moment. I know your anger, I know your frustration, I’ve lived them myself.
You told me you don’t want half a father, an absent father.
How can you know what is best for you, if when you had that father with you, he was already in half, he was already absent, he was already empty and the thought never even visited your mind?
I don’t blame you. You are just a boy. And no, this is not me insulting you. It’s just the truth.
You don’t know what’s best for you yet. So I have to decide for both of us. And for now, this is the only way.
I would like to see your face when you read this, but that won’t happen.
You see, before I started writing I had a realization. There is no way to plant a seed of an ideal in your head. I can’t make you see truth. But I’m writing the letter anyways.
And no, I won’t save it. I won’t put it on a drawer and let it sit there for years until you’re old enough. This story doesn’t go that way. In this story there is a campfire, and I’m in front of it during a hot summer night, looking at the moon. I’m writing on a piece of paper. When I finish with it, I’ll read it, and then I’ll throw it away to the fire. I’ll let it burn, let it be destroyed. Because what is a letter with truth inside if it’s not going to be taken serious? Is just a group of words, a string of letters composed harmoniously, for no one to read.
And so I say good bye.
When I met you I fell in love with your innocence, your ingenuity, your ignorance towards life. That has not disappeared. As my own master, life itself, has thought me, I’m certain she’ll teach you as well. I can just hope you are ready to listen.
This words are for my son that is not my son, from his father that is not his father.
I’ll be the father you need, even if you’re oblivious to this fact. Not for recognition, not for you to take care of me when I’m old. But because that’s what love does.
I love you.
Your Father
The father took a deep breath.
He removed the tears from his eyes. He cleaned them well.
And just like those tears, that came from the deepest of his soul, he closed the file he’d just written, and the words that came from that same soul, were lost in time.
Save?
No
He closed his computer. Put it back in the backpack.
The time was now 14:15. Time to catch a flight. Time to keep moving forward.
For we only move forward by the love we feel for ourselves and others.
Free Your Mind.
