Ode to my Dad: Patrick Connors

 Ode to my Dad
What I Am Left With

 

Walter Gretzky died two days before my Dad.
They were both born in 1938. Other than that,
they had almost nothing in common.

My Dad and me also had very little in common
except our first names
and our last

the propensity to drink
as a means of dealing with anxiety
and a deep and abiding love in Jesus Christ.

My childhood was a hopeless struggle, founded
on pleasing my Dad, protecting my Mom
and becoming the next Wayne Gretzky.

My Dad was deeply damaged.
He was torn between trying to save us
from this damage and sharing how it felt.

Finally, we became
a family, found the courage
to leave the source of our abuse.

I started to live my life
and make my own mistakes
and then, eventually, become sane.

Decades later, after
a few vain attempts to make peace
I found out my Dad was very ill.

I couldn't go see him.
In the times of Covid, 5 provinces away
it just wasn't possible.

From decades gone by
the distance may as well have been
a million miles, even in the same room.

My Dad died.
The pain he felt and the pain he inflicted
cannot be reconciled.

I never got to tell him how much he hurt me.
I never got to say I forgave him.
I never got to say goodbye.

 

Patrick Connors

health update and old age crazy car

 
I've been recovering a lot more quickly than I'd anticipated. And yep, I've been enjoying a lazy summer wading at Callaghan's Rapids Conservation Area almost every sunny and hot summer day recently. I've even managed to tan the foot long incision so that it hardly shows now. Of course I don't know what's going on inside my guts and how well the colon is healing, and I wasn't given instructions on how long it should take, or how active I should be, etc., so I'm just hoping I'm doing the right things by not being too active. I don't get or give a report with my surgeon until mid-September,  when I'll learn if the lymphatics which were stripped near the tumour were also cancerous. If so, I'll be scheduled for chemo and such - arrgggh. Fingers and toes crossed!

It may have been a subconscious anticipation, but I'm glad I took out the reverse mortgage loan back in March. I feel like I'm in a late-in-life reprieve after the life saving operation, and I want to enjoy this anticipated final decade (if I'm lucky) of my life. So a few weeks ago I bought a middle age crazy sports car. I think I'm regressing to my teen years, pre the hippie phase, when I tooled around in cheap but very cool British sports cars like an MGA and two bugeye Healey sprites  :  )- When I decided the hippie thing was more suited my personality I traded the MG for a beat-up old VW, but at age 74 I'm now zipping around in a 2006 Mazda miata. It's cliche red with red leather bucket seats, a 6 speed, dual exhaust, and 170 horse power. I used to be dismissive of miatas as a "chicks' car", but the newer models are a lot spunkier and sophisticated than the earlier ones.

 

 

 

not my car, but same year and colour