Loss and selfishness
I'm cranky. I'm sick, tried to call in, but since nobody could cover my shift I had to be here. Ok, I can deal with that. It's crazy busy, and we need the coverage. Whatever.
But my boss still hasn't approved my vacation request I sent in weeks ago. I told him when I sent it that I needed it because my dad is going in for surgery and I have to be there.
Now it turns out that my best friends father, a man who I admired greatly growing up, is dying of cancer. He's in end stage, and they've given him anywhere from 3 weeks to 3 months. I have to see this man before he dies. I just have to. I don't know why. He was somebody who... I don't know. He loved me, very much. And was very vocal about it. I grew up surrounded by such restrained people, and he was so vibrant and ebullient. He actually scared the crap out of me for most of my life. He respected me. In a way that I didn't know how to respond to. He expected more of me, and when I disappointed him... my god. It was traumatic. His face when he gently, brutally told me the truth that I'd been hiding from, is an image that is seared in my brain.
I was able to hoodwink most of the people in my life, convince them I was better than I was. He saw through all of that, and yet he still respected me. To a teenager, that was terrifying. I didn't understand how he could feel that way. I knew I was a liar, and so did he.
As an adult, I can look back and appreciate how he forced me to grow into that respect. How he helped me become honest. As a kid, he was just somebody I had to work harder to hide from.
He still asks about me, calls me "my Sarah", asks my family how I'm doing. When I went back to visit my family 2 years ago, I saw him at my brothers house, who's his son-in-law. He looked amazingly hale and hearty. He hugged me with a giant grin on his face, looked askance at my clothes, and asked me how I was. I turned into a stuttering 15 year old, afraid of being found out. He genuinely scared me, still.
The thought of seeing him now, 2 years and much soul searching later, is still terrifying. I get a little sick to my stomach, thinking about seeing him as he is now, sick and dying, remembering what he's always been. He was always a handsome man. Blue black skin, beautiful, giant white smile... he wore a toupee for most of my life, and the moment when I first saw him without it is still told as an epically funny story in that family. Muscular and burly, he always smelled like menthol from the icy/hot he used for his sore muscles. Hugging him was like hugging an evergreen tree in winter. He was strong, intensely physical, extremely down to earth and practical. He bought a porta-potty for the back of his luxury econovan, and made us girls use it on the many road trips he took us on. I can't begin to tell you how traumatic that was to the couple of New England bred, repressed, uptight little girls that my sister and I were.
I want to be able to tell him how he helped me grow into my own truth. I don't know that it would be helpful or appropriate, because I left his truth to find my own. He's a devoutly religious man, and my defection caused him a lot of pain. But his face is part of my pantheon of self doubt and growth, something I see when I realize I'm being untrue to myself and others. I want him to know how much I respect him, love him. It's selfish, the need to tell him this before he's gone. It won't do him any good, not really. He's led a beautiful life in many ways. He's loved and respected by countless people, and my feelings would be a drop in a very full bucket.
It won't really do me any good either, but I still feel this overwhelming urge to do it.
But my boss still hasn't approved my vacation request I sent in weeks ago. I told him when I sent it that I needed it because my dad is going in for surgery and I have to be there.
Now it turns out that my best friends father, a man who I admired greatly growing up, is dying of cancer. He's in end stage, and they've given him anywhere from 3 weeks to 3 months. I have to see this man before he dies. I just have to. I don't know why. He was somebody who... I don't know. He loved me, very much. And was very vocal about it. I grew up surrounded by such restrained people, and he was so vibrant and ebullient. He actually scared the crap out of me for most of my life. He respected me. In a way that I didn't know how to respond to. He expected more of me, and when I disappointed him... my god. It was traumatic. His face when he gently, brutally told me the truth that I'd been hiding from, is an image that is seared in my brain.
I was able to hoodwink most of the people in my life, convince them I was better than I was. He saw through all of that, and yet he still respected me. To a teenager, that was terrifying. I didn't understand how he could feel that way. I knew I was a liar, and so did he.
As an adult, I can look back and appreciate how he forced me to grow into that respect. How he helped me become honest. As a kid, he was just somebody I had to work harder to hide from.
He still asks about me, calls me "my Sarah", asks my family how I'm doing. When I went back to visit my family 2 years ago, I saw him at my brothers house, who's his son-in-law. He looked amazingly hale and hearty. He hugged me with a giant grin on his face, looked askance at my clothes, and asked me how I was. I turned into a stuttering 15 year old, afraid of being found out. He genuinely scared me, still.
The thought of seeing him now, 2 years and much soul searching later, is still terrifying. I get a little sick to my stomach, thinking about seeing him as he is now, sick and dying, remembering what he's always been. He was always a handsome man. Blue black skin, beautiful, giant white smile... he wore a toupee for most of my life, and the moment when I first saw him without it is still told as an epically funny story in that family. Muscular and burly, he always smelled like menthol from the icy/hot he used for his sore muscles. Hugging him was like hugging an evergreen tree in winter. He was strong, intensely physical, extremely down to earth and practical. He bought a porta-potty for the back of his luxury econovan, and made us girls use it on the many road trips he took us on. I can't begin to tell you how traumatic that was to the couple of New England bred, repressed, uptight little girls that my sister and I were.
I want to be able to tell him how he helped me grow into my own truth. I don't know that it would be helpful or appropriate, because I left his truth to find my own. He's a devoutly religious man, and my defection caused him a lot of pain. But his face is part of my pantheon of self doubt and growth, something I see when I realize I'm being untrue to myself and others. I want him to know how much I respect him, love him. It's selfish, the need to tell him this before he's gone. It won't do him any good, not really. He's led a beautiful life in many ways. He's loved and respected by countless people, and my feelings would be a drop in a very full bucket.
It won't really do me any good either, but I still feel this overwhelming urge to do it.
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