I grew up calling my step father ‘dad’. My mother married him when I was 2 and, once he left, she didn’t know how to break it to us (I’m a twin) that he wasn’t, in fact, our biological father. Our bio-dad was someone who, when she told him she was pregnant, suggested she terminate the pregnancy so her life wouldn’t be ruined.
It was the summer after high school, years after ‘dad’ had moved to Asia and remarried (a 25 year old), that, on a visit to America with his new family, he casually mentioned to me that he wasn’t my father. We stopped talking shortly thereafter. I wasn’t mad at anyone for lying, parents do what they think is right to protect their kids, and I might have done the same thing in that position.
Over the next little while, my mom told us everything she knew about our real father. He was a charming French man, he was a doctor with the Red Cross, he had one older daughter. We looked him up online and found nothing. Life got in the way, and we gave up our search.
A couple years later our mom died, and out of the blue my twin brother decided to Google our father’s name again, but somehow this time, we found a potential lead. I managed to get in touch with him and the next thing I knew I had an online father and was skyping with him on a regular basis. We had so much in common: we liked the same kind of movies (romance), loved to travel, enjoyed the same kinds of food, had similar personalities.
A year later I flew to France to meet him and we spent a week together. He let me take photos of my mom he had hidden in an album, and introduced me to his best friends. His wife – who he hadn’t told about me and my brother – hated me. It was an emotional week, but a good one.
The following year, I was passing through Paris and he drove the five hours to spend the weekend with me. We fought the entire time. It was silly, about little things like not being able to find parking, or him being annoyed that I was on my computer too much. It felt like we had known each other forever, and were bickering like real family.
We ended the weekend with a hug and a kiss and telling each other that we love each other even if we fight.
I felt like I kind of had a father.
Our relationship was mostly online due to long distance, and we were both trying to figure out this whole father-daughter thing — he didn’t talk to his first born child and my relationship with my ex-step father wasn’t really one I wanted to replicate. Neither of us knew what we were doing but we were trying.
Our conversations became less frequent, he complained a lot about his health and didn’t show up for our Skype dates or pick up his cellphone when I called. I started to get annoyed and write catty emails to him. Then, I saw an email from his wife — the one who didn’t like me: he was dead.
I spent most Father’s days after my step dad left bringing flowers to my mom — after all she was essentially my mother and father.
This Father’s Day though, I think of my biological father and the relationship that we were building that was cut short.
I don’t know what having a father is meant to be like, yet, I can’t help but feel sad because when I least expected it, I got a father, but also when I least expected it, I lost him. I wish I had been more courteous towards him, given him the benefit of the doubt, believed him when he couldn’t make our Skype sessions, rather than assuming he just wasn’t interested and was being an absent father — like he had always been.
So today, while my Facebook newsfeed is filled with friends smiling with their dads, I reminisce about the two times I met my father, and wonder why I never thought to take a photo with him to post on social media on Father’s Day….
