Divorce is a really difficult event in anyone’s life, no matter how old you are. My
parents never argued about anything specific that I could remember, and I just could not
understand at that time in my life why Daddy left us. Today I know why they split up but in all the years since, I have never been able to get either one of them to talk about it to me; both of them saying “it was too long ago to rehash.” I had just turned four years old and my little sister was not even yet walking the day Daddy moved out.
I remember my father traveled a lot and he would be gone for what could seem
like forever to a small child. When he was home he took me everywhere with him. He
often took me to his small office, sat me on the floor with Legos and coloring books
where I pretended to be working too. The promise of ice cream kept me quiet and
occupied for hours. He often pulled me into his arms for those enormous bear hugs, fluffed my hair with his big hands, said how much he loved me and I was his “precious child.“ In a wall cupboard in his office he kept a comforter for me to lie on and a pillow if I wanted to take a nap. The comforter was white on one side with dark blue and white stripes on the other. My pillow had images of little Winnie the Poohs and Tiggers floating on fluffy clouds. Those were magic times with my daddy but those times did not last forever. After he moved out it was like he forgot me and I felt as though I was amputated from his life.
I look back on what could have been real catalysts for my parents’ eventual split
but at the time I blamed it on my little sister Amy. As close as she and I are today, I often
experience a lot of guilt over all the blame I secretly heaped upon her, oblivious as she
was of the situation at the time. Before Amy was born, I overheard Daddy say something
about “an accident” and “family.” Mommy said, “I didn’t do this by myself.” I was a big
kid before I understood what that meant.
After Amy was born, Daddy seemed to be gone more and for longer periods of
time. When I asked Mommy why Daddy was gone so much, she reassured me that
“Daddy is working to take care of us because he loves his family.” I took that as
everything was fine.
The pivotal event that changed my family was one night when Mommy picked Daddy up at the airport. It was almost dark outside and the old red Volvo sedan’s windows were foggy inside. Amy and I were in the back seat, strapped into our car seats. When Daddy got into the car, Mommy leaned over to kiss him and he pushed her face away with his hand. Mommy said, “What is wrong with you?”
“I don’t want you here. She was supposed to pick me up.” He would not
look at Mommy who started crying.
“Why don’t you want us? You have everything you said you always wanted and yet you don’t want it anymore. What happened?”
I remember he just would not look at Mommy and he acted like he did not know
we were in the back seat. “Hi Daddy,” I said. “Hi Daddy,” I said again thinking he
did not hear me the first time.
As Mommy drove home, everyone was really quiet. Even Amy, for once, was quiet, like she knew there was something wrong. Mommy got us out of the car, carried Amy on her hip. Daddy was already in the house and he slammed the front door in Mommy’s face as she walked up the red brick front porch steps. Daddy turned on the overhead ceiling light in their bedroom and was grabbing clothes out of the closet, throwing them on the bed.
Amy and I already had our baths and were in our pajamas. Mommy put Amy in her crib, tucked me into bed, kissed us good night and told me to stay in bed no matter what I heard. Amy went right to sleep but I laid in the dark, listening to their voices rise and fall in muffled dialogue.
I heard the front door slam and Daddy’s car drive away. I heard Amy’s and my bedroom door quietly open and saw Mommy’s shadow on the wall from the bathroom night light as she checked on us. I shut my eyes really tight. Then I heard the door quietly close. I stayed awake as long as I could, listening for Daddy’s car to come back.
When I opened my eyes, the morning sun was coming through the windows, softly filtered by the blue and white gingham curtains. Amy was still asleep, on her face with her rear end in the air. I listened and I heard.nothing. I got up, put my red slippers on, grabbed my pillow for defense, and quietly opened the bedroom door. I looked down the hall and saw our collie dog Lucy lying on the white tile floor. She opened her eyes when she heard me. Her tail slapped on the tile in greeting.
Lucy stood up and walked along side me as I quietly walked through the hall to my parents’ bedroom. The door was closed. In the living room Mommy was asleep on the couch, still dressed in her clothes from the night before. She opened her eyes and sat up when she realized I was awake too. Her eyes were red and puffy, but she smiled anyway.
She held her finger to her lips and whispered, “Shhhh. Daddy is still asleep.” We made pancakes for breakfast to have something to do until he woke up, I realized later.
Daddy came out of the bedroom still dressed in his gray pants and white shirt from the night before, carrying clothes over his arms. “Hi Daddy.” He would not look at me. He took the clothes to his blue sedan, opened the trunk and hoisted the armloads of clothes in. Leaving the trunk open, he came back into the house and took more clothes out to his car.
Mommy was standing behind me the whole time this was going on. Daddy would not look at her but on one of his trips to the car, he passed by her and said, “I really wished you had taken the kids to your mother’s until this was over.”
“No, they need to see this. They need to know that you are leaving them.” Mommy put her hands on my shoulders, gentle pressure with her finger tips.
I was not sure what was happening but I did not think it had anything to do with me. Daddy was my Daddy, and he loved me so much.I am his precious child.
“That is all I can take today. I’ll come get more later.” Daddy told Mommy on the way out the front door. The trunk looked full of his clothes and he slammed it shut. He came back up the walkway and looked down at me. He looked like he was made of stone; absolutely no emotion in his face. He put out his right hand, shook hands with me and said, “You have to be Mommy’s big helper now. I am not going to be around anymore.” He pivoted on his heels, and walked away. He got in his car, slammed the door, gunned the engine and drove off.
For weeks Mommy and I pretended that Daddy was away on a business trip. It was weeks before Mommy finally told me that Daddy was not coming home again. She said it was no one’s fault that Daddy wasn’t happy and he has to work things out for himself. I was not sure what those “things” were.
My dad’s visitations were few and far between over the years. It was only for a few hours on an occasional Sunday afternoon when he could “fit it into his schedule.” He said he lived far away and could not see us very much. As Amy and I got older, we found out that he had had a girlfriend while Mom was pregnant with Amy, and he was living twelve miles away.so far awayuh-huh. Sure. After he left that morning, he cleaned out his and Mom’s savings, bought a red Porsche and snorted the rest up his nose.
We were never again close from that day when he shook my hand and told me to be Mommy’s big helper. It was like I was amputated from his life the day Daddy moved out.
