A Lullaby on Father's Day

I was going to write a post today about how my preparations are going for the trek and more fundraising efforts. However I got sidetracked with it being Father's Day.

On this blog that has at it's heart my Mother's memory, I am writing about my Dad and listening to a Lullaby today.

I really wanted the next blog entry to be a more upbeat post.Joy and laughter are what I need to be creating in my life right now not dwelling on the past or what might have been. Writing about my family lends itself most easily to feelings of sorrow and regret, however. So let's just say that this will be a brave post. It is here in my heart and my finger tips and so it must be written.

My Father was brave, though I know my sisters would argue that he was in fact a coward. The truth was that he was both light and shadow, as we human beings are. I loved him just the same of course as a little girl and young woman. Later I was angry with him and sad for him, all at the same time when I came to understand him more.

When I am off on my walks just lately, I sometimes think of Dad when he was younger. Apparently he liked to take my sisters out for walks or so I am told.

My sister, the one who these days most likes walking, tells me stories of Dad marching them for miles, on walks around the local area. She tells the story of a Dad who was not kind, and from her words I picture him like an angry sergeant major, who trampled all over his wife and children's hearts.

It is hard for me to see him that way, although I know that his behaviour at times was frightening and bullying. I cannot minimise this but my view of him is distorted, I only saw the light for many years, just as my sister only saw the shadow.

I love it that she likes walking so much and music too. Maybe those marches through the countryside were not all bad? Much of her memory is clouded by all the dark events that happened before my Mum's death. Maybe I can be comforted that my Dad was trying to share a love of walking with his daughters. Just trying to be a Dad the best he could, when his own experience of being parented had been a poor one.

I saw a different side of my Dad than the rest of my siblings. This must have been the person my Mum fell in love with, when they were both so young. A young man who loved music and art, who liked painting and reading, who was articulate and charming. Then an older man with a thirst for knowledge, someone who had never really fullfilled his potential. A compassionate person who understood the feelings of others, liked watching animal documentaries, loved children, travelling and history.

Nothing he could ever do would put things right for my sisters. I can't share him with them now, as the pain and bitterness is too raw for them.

I don't make excuses for much of his behaviour as a husband and father, but I understand something of how he came to allow his shadow to overwhelm his life.

Empire Of the Sun was his favourite film. He was born in 1930 and so the second world war affected him deeply on many different levels. He lived away from his mother for some of his very early childhood. These times were some of his darkest memories but he shared little detail about what happened to him. He remembered evacuees coming to stay with the family during the war but spoke little of his step-father or other memories of that time. He only once mentioned to me the types of discipline he suffered at the hands of the adults who were in charge of his upbringing. He never knew his own father as his mother was unmarried when he was born. I think he carried a great deal of guilt and shame about this, as of course, he would have been a child to be whispered about back then.

The song from the film is a Welsh Lullaby - Suo Gan - quite beautiful. Jamie sings it I think to comfort himself and the young Japanese pilot he had previously made friends with.

I can't watch the film without crying! I think my Dad would have identified with Jamie in the film and he would also have felt for the young Japanese kamikaze pilots sent to their death. What madness is war? I know my Dad would feel the same way I do about the continuing attrocities happening to children throughout the world. He would shake his head in disbelief at how we are still watching countries continuing to send their young people to fight and die and the choices that governments continue to make. All this damage!

Father's day thoughts, love and strength sent to Dads everywhere and to "Dadless" children today.