Family Encounters-F

My father passed on nearly ten years before I got married. He was not present for my College graduation, nor was he alive when I finished high school. My youngest sibling was nine months old. There was a period of grief at his passing, but then survival demands appeared and said, “Let there be life”. So I moved on. At the time, his absence never bothered me. I learned to live without him; to leap from boy to man. I never accused or charged him for dying too soon; or did I? I never blamed him for the pains and the wounds; or did I? There were signs that he was becoming a better person to live with; but I don’t really know how I would have differed had he lived longer. Many years later I realized that I subconsciously shut him out; I shouldn’t have. I angrily charged him for things he did and judgmentally accused him of things he shouldn’t have done. Without mercy, I sentenced and banished him and all that he represented; but I shouldn’t have. Subconsciously, I reacted to his negative ways and rendered him irrelevant. There were things I did not know, and other things I never considered. I silently, without fuss or fight, without sufficient evidence, shut him out. Yes, I rendered him unimportant and irrelevant; anything positive was blocked out, never rising to an appreciative level. It would take years to even realize this. Yes, father was dead physically, but he deserved a kind memory. However, for years I was as if silent and frozen, unable to remember anything of value. But then it happened!! Twelve years ago at a family reunion, a younger sister spoke well of our father and sat me straight. She spoke of things I never knew of the man whose memory I had crushed, and whose influence I thought I could live without. She spoke of a man I never knew and painted a portrait of a man that was kind, caring, and sensitive toward others. It was like a reunion with my long-deceased father; and as if I was given a second encounter with him. I tell you, I forgave him and consciously let his influence and memory back into my life, and I am the better for it. 07112015