Father's Day
With father’s day around the corner, someone recently asked what my father’s day was like in comparison. I love when people ask me about how my father’s absence has affected my life- because in a lot of ways I don’t realize it until I’m confronted with it. Because I can’t really ever remember a father’s day with my dad, Ruby just reminded me we used to make breakfast in bed and homemade cards; it’s just a normal day for us. We don’t even really know the date of it. I know a lot of friends whose father’s are also not in their life, or they don’t speak to them anymore, and that’s always the hardest for me. It kind of just loops around to the idea of “taking things for granted.” There’s waves of sadness that come over me during the day, a lot of my friends can’t hangout because they’re with their dads, everyone posts photos with their dads, etc. I could still post photos of my dad (and we all know I do) and I can still be with my family, but because my family now solely consists of estrogen ( NOT a bad thing at all) the testosterone of that day is nonexistent.
I think a lot about what I would do with my dad on Father’s Day. I see gifts sometimes that I would get him and I often think about where we would go, or what movie we would see. The day feels a little bit longer than others (it’s the same with the anniversary of his death and his birthday)and it’s harder to make a day out of it. We usually will do a dinner or something but the hours in the day feel longer. It’s harder to spend a day celebrating someone when they aren’t there to help you. Overall, I think the concept of father’s day is just another corporate agenda of hallmark and is an excuse for tokenism (Annabel-you senile bitch!), but it really makes me happy to see people appreciate their dads. Something about it makes me really, really happy. That’s probably the part of me that knows something is missing. Because as much as I want to pretend father’s day isn’t a special day, and that it’s not important, it’s a day I could’ve been with my dad. I could’ve spent the entire day with him laughing, and cooking, and as a full family. Over the years though, I’ve had to learn that his days (father’s day, birthday, anniversary) are to be celebrated as they would be if he was alive. So this father’s day we’ll do it Frankie B’s way, smoke a cigar (just kidding), drink some whiskey (no f*cking way), and grill some burgers (aka order some.) and who knows, maybe I’ll just get another tattoo to celebrate instead. ;)
