The Secret Superpower

"Will we be better off if he were not part of the picture?"  This was a thought that circled my mind for many, many years.  And the "he" in question, was our father.

I can confidently say that my father was not a very good father.  It always seemed like he would rather spend time with his friends eating, drinking and playing mahjong than to be with his family.  And even when he did, he seemed distracted and bored.

My father had five children, but he never seemed to take much interest in his kids.  When we were little, I loved it when he took us swimming -- mostly because I loved to swim.  I dreaded it, however, when he offered to teach me how to swim or dive.  His pedagogy was very simple: he would take you to the deep end and then throw you into the water.  "Keep your head up and swim back here!'  The fact that we survived, to him, was solid proof that his method worked.

Occasionally, when he tried playing with us, he often played too rough and made us cry.  Then, he got upset and frustrated.  Clearly, it was our fault.  "Don't fuss me.  Go to your mother.  Leave me alone."  I learnt at a young age to not go to him for support or comfort.  

My father was not a very good husband either.  He and my mother had a troubled relationship.  It was not like they did not love or care about each other.  It was just unfortunate that they had very different ideas about love, romance and relationships.  Till the very end, they could not reconcile their differences.  They both harbored much resentment against each other.  

One early morning fourteen years ago, my mother found him sleeping in some rather unusual position.  His skin was cold to the touch, although his chest was still warm.  There was no breathing and no heartbeat.  He quietly left the world with a faint smile on his face.  My father's sudden death was shocking to us all, particularly to our mother.  Intertwined with her sadness was abundant anger.  Some of these strong emotions remain unresolved to this day.

When things were really bad between our parents, we, the children, tried playing mediators.  Our mother would always tell us how she was victimized by our father.  We heard a lot of stories about his misdeeds and how she suffered.  Our father, on the other hand, seldom said much.  More than often, he just looked unhappy and acted grumpy.  "I have so much pain and anguish that you would never understand," he used to say.  My sister, the "Daddy's Girl" in the family, would challenge him, "Oh, yeah?"  Thinking that our father was the villain, she would press him, "Tell me about your pain and anguish.  C'mon!  Say it out loud.  Let's all hear it."  Yet, our father would only shake his head and refused to talk.  "Nope.  You won't understand."  Taking our mother's side, we just concluded that our father declined to tell his side of the story because there was nothing good he had to say.  He was the source of our problems.

After his death, many of the everyday household matters that my father used to deal with are now our responsibility.  We have to work more closely with our mother, and that is when we get to see a side of her that we did not see before . . . 

One time, when she was visiting us in the US, I found myself feeling really reluctant to get out of bed in the morning.  The moment I put my feet on the floor, given our old creaky house, she would hear me from downstairs.  Another day of battles with my mother would begin.  I lied in bed till I must get up to tend to the day.  I would let out a sigh and a big, pruny frown would come onto my face.  I was unhappy and I acted grumpy . . . just like my late father.  That was when I began to share the pain and anguish that he refused to talk about, except for his must had been constant and much more intense. 

During a visit to Hong Kong, I had a long talk with my mother about my father.  It had been years since his passing, but she was still dwelling on the misdeeds of her late husband.  I could not argue with her for the most part.  My father lacked good role models for both spousal or parental skills.  As an older person, looking back, I can see that he actually tried.  He probably would love to be a different husband and a different father, but he did not know how.  He was a victim of his circumstances.  

"Mom, I, myself, have been married for so many years now.  To me, it is inevitable that both parties play a role when a situation comes up.  I grow up listening to you telling us the various wrongdoings of our father.  Can you honestly say to me that you never made a mistake?  Nothing is ever your fault?"

My questions were met with dead silence.

"Nobody is perfect, Mom.  My father definitely was a flawed person, but so are you.  Having said that, there was one amazing thing that he did that I don't think I can ever emulate:  I have never heard him say one bad thing about you.  He never badmouthed his wife and he never made his children take sides.  No matter how misunderstood he might be, he just swallowed it and took the blame.  I didn't understand it then, but I do now.  Yes, he had done a lot of things that hurt you, but he also had been protecting you the entire time.  He made sure that your children never heard anything negative about their mother.  Don't you think that was some great love he had for you?"

Again, it was dead silence.

I have no idea if our conversation changed anything on my mother's mind about her late husband.  For me, my new understanding shines a very different light on the way I look at the man.  

My father may be the worst swimming coach or playmate for his kids, but he definitely was a fierce protector for his wife's reputation.  For that alone, I owe him severe love and respect.  How I wish I had known him better and sooner . . .