My Father Died...

[Leo656]

Sorry to mess with everyone's holiday. I haven't been around a lot since we moved back in with Mary's parents, but I felt like I should toss this out there since I can get on right now.

My Dad died early morning on Christmas Eve. He had been living with my sister for almost two years, after spending almost 6 months in the hospital before that. Her boyfriend Calvin went into his room to wake him up Friday morning, and he was gone. He had just been up and about a couple hours earlier.

I mention it not because I'm looking for attention, or sympathy, but because a few of you have been here a long time, and may remember over years how I would write about the tempestuous relationship he and I had. Often I would come here and vent when he was being a jerk, or was high on drugs, or when we were looking at being homeless because he blew off the rent again. There were times I came here and said I hated him. That I wanted him out of my life. And worse. So a few of you might know the situation.

But even though things were bad, and there were times he acted as a bad person, times when he was selfish and even cruel, that wasn't at all who he always was. Drugs made him that way over time. When my mother died, he buried himself in crack and cocaine because he just never could handle any emotional stress. He went from a casual user into a full blown remorseless addict because, for him, it was easier than living life. It was easier than paying attention to all the things we lost over time. It's no excuse for the things he did, and that's why we fought so much. We said and did things to each other that, on the streets, would carry jail time. In fact, the last time either of us was in any trouble with the law was when the cops took us both in for fighting about 4 years ago. And as we sat in holding I looked at him and said, half-joking, "You know we're both getting too old for this."

But before all that, it may be hard to believe but I remember, he wasn't just a good person, he was the best. When I was little, no father did more for his son. He worked seven days a week most times, at Squibb Pharmaceuticals during the week and bartended on Sundays. He had three older kids from his first marriage to provide for, so he worked every hour God sent so we would have enough. But while some kids were mad at their parents working so much, I understood, and I never resented him for that. He taught me before I was even old enough to write my name, you have to work hard and sacrifice if you want to have anything. When he had a major heart attack and operation in 1993, they told him he couldn't work anymore. He was on permanent disability, but when the welfare wasn't enough (and it never was), he took any odd job under the table he could. Delivering pizza or flowers, busing tables, even slaving in a hot pizza kitchen despite his bad heart, he did what he had to do. He taught me about hard work and sacrifice, and he never, ever complained.

He had broken both his arms and legs several times since he was a kid and was full of steel plates and screws. He even got in a car wreck a few years ago at 60 years old that threw him through the windshield, broke his neck and would have killed most people. He laughed that off, just like he laughed off the numerous heart surgeries, the pacemaker/defibrillator they put in, the fluid that often filled his lungs, and dozens of bouts with pneumonia. My niece, who lived with him at the end, never knew of any of this until I told her recently, because he never spoke of it. If he was ever in any pain, he never said a word. If I could be that tough, or even half as brave, I'd be quite a man.

Not only did he not complain, he went out of his way to spend time with his kids, until just the last 10 years when the drugs were running his life. My brothers and sister were grown by the time I was born, and he would always go hunting and fishing with my brothers on weekends, or to concerts with my mother and her daughter Laura. Even though Laura wasn't his daughter, she never knew her father so he raised her as his own even though she didn't live with us. And he did more for me and with me than most dads, I know that for a fact, despite being spread so thin. I wish I had told him how much all that meant to me; how I still remember every Christmas and every present even when we didn't have money and he would still manage gifts; every game of wiffleball and every trip to the park; every comic book and trip to the movies; every Saturday morning watching wrestling together and every big Sunday breakfast. I never forgot any of it, but in recent years we hurt each other so much that I just forgot to remember. Now I have to live with the guilt that I never thanked him enough, because even at his worst, he was better than I deserved.

He gave me so much. He taught me how to beat Donkey Kong before I could even read. He taught me how to read with comics, and had such a laugh when I would dress up like Superman and fly around the house. He first put wrestling on the tv, and was so proud of his little Hulkamaniac. He thought He-Man was he best cartoon ever, and absolutely loved the Dolph Lundren movie when he took me to see it. Just recently he was saying how "Stupid" people who didn't like it were. Everything I am, from TMNT to comics to games to wrestling, it all came from him. He never pushed me to like the things he liked; he knew I hated football and sports, he knew I didn't like hunting or fishing much, but he never pushed me, and even though he'd tease me sometimes, he never made me feel bad about the things I liked. Most of all, he was proud that I was never into drugs like him.

He gave me so much, and he never stopped giving. The very last thing he gave me was a check last Christmas; I used that money to buy the wrestling tights I wear in the ring, the ones guys in the locker room are jealous of. But the greatest thing he ever did for me, was when he came to see my first match in August. My whole life, that was my dream: that I would be a wrestler and my Dad would be there to see me. He came three times this year, even though I told him not to if he was too sick or hurt. He didn't care; he had to be there, and he was. The very last time I saw him, he was in the front row for my match in Sayerville in Nov., and the smile on his face was worth a million bucks. When he was a kid, he would go see Killer Kowalski in Highland Park, and he would take me all the way to Philly to see Hulk Hogan; the final show he went to, the last thing he ever went out to do, was to come see me wrestle. I'll never forget that as long as I live.

I wish we'd had more time. I wish the drugs didn't steal him from me for so long, and I wish we didn't fight so much. But selfishly, I just could not turn my head and ignore the fact that he was hurting himself so badly. I knew since the first heart attack that we were on borrowed time; it killed me that he was so intent on wasting it. There were days he blew me off to be with his drug friends; he'd even say they mattered more to him, and it hurt even though I knew deep down it wasn't true. I was mean right back, because I just wanted the real person back, I wanted my Dad all to myself for as long as I could keep him, because he really was the best of us, underneath it all.

I implore each of you, don't waste the time you're given. Don't allow yourself to be annoyed by things that don't matter, like a slow driver or a foot of snow. Laugh at them, like my father did, because he knew better than all of us that these things pass. When it's all over, you don't remember the stupid, little bullsh*t we bitch about every day. All that matters is spending the time you have the best way you can, with the people who really matter. Don't waste your life. Don't put off things that you can do today. None of us are promised a tomorrow. I was supposed to see my father the day after Christmas, and I was going to write him a letter saying thank you, so he knew that I remembered everything, that I really didn't hate him even when I said I did. The rest of my life, I have to live with the pain, the spite, and the guilt, and not knowing for sure if he knew how I really felt. Don't let that happen to you.

Most of all, don't let drugs run your life. I watched a man who was just this side of a saint slowly become a monster. It wasn't really him, but people don't even realize the things they say and do when they fall victim to drugs. It changes you. He more than anyone insisted he knew what he was doing, and could stop whenever he wanted, that he was in control, meanwhile he let his whole life fall to pieces. Just last week, we spoke on the phone, and he sadly said to me, "I f*cked myself. I let it go too far. I can't fish anymore, can't do anything. I did it to myself, and I didn't have to. You were always right, I just wanted to have a good time. I did, and now I can't do anything. This sucks." He was only 65, the youngest in his family to die of natural causes. I've had people in my family live to more than 105, and while that wasn't realistic for him in the shape he'd been in since his 40s, he could have had a lot more time, if only he'd taken care of himself. The high school football star who played on the team with Joe Theisman could barely stand or walk, and that isn't f*cking fair.

Don't waste your time. Don't waste your life.