post father's day tribute to my father, sort of

Every time I fill up forms requiring my father’s personal data, I call up my sister. Even now, I feel guilty that I do not remember his age nor could recall his birth date.

I do not have childhood memory with my father. I tried to search for pictures of myself with my father, those old sepia pictures which conjures images of nostalgia, but there are none. I tried to psychoanalyze myself to salvage any remnant of special moments with my father that might have fossilized deep in my subconscious the way Shrinks do in the movies but all I have are bits of pieces of commercials and movies and memories of my friends with their fathers that I took as my own: father carrying his son on his shoulder, father and son feeding animals in the zoo, father teaching his son to tie his shoe laces, father and son eating dirty ice cream in the park, father and son playing baseball together..

It is understandable because my father left for the Middle East when I was about five to six years old. He worked there for three years to earn money for the college education of my elder sister.

I recall one time he sent us a battery-powered toy car. It did not say to whom it was so we assumed the seven of us are co-owners. To prevent us from killing each other, my mother declared that it was for our eyes only. She displayed the poor toy car in our cupboard. I never had chance to show it off to my playmates.

I have pictures of my father during his youth. He was handsome and lean. He looked like one of those leading men in Latin tele novelas: suave and charming. In all his pictures, he is perennially japorms , wearing tight polos with sleeves folded, unbuttoned to reveal his chest hairs . I figured that is their version of coolness during those times.

He is a farmer and a carpenter at the same. In between the seasonal tilling of the land he constructs house and buildings. Weathered by years of hard work which usually involved labor outdoors come rain or shine, and generous amount of nicotine- my father has become fragile, wrinkled and darkly tanned. His fingers are calloused, seasoned by years of pounding nails, polishing wood and metal, mixing graveland sand and laying boulders and bricks of buildings. His toe nails are permanently stained caused by constant soaking in the loamy farm.

I look at my father now and I see no more vestiges of his youthful good looks. Yet, there is still dignity and pride in his bearing. He may be old and wrinkled but he is still our unflagging family sentinel.

My father may not qualify for the best father award but he should be credited for all our successes. He has flaws. According to my mother, my father had vices: he smoked a lot, gambled, and had numerous extra-marital affairs. On several occasions, she caught him in fragrante with other married woman. In fact, she suspects that we have several siblings scattered around the barangay. When my elder sister and brother were growing up, he tried to change and strive hard to be responsible father.

Both of my parents came from a family of farmers. When they married, they had no capital, property nor degree from which they could begin with. I could not imagine how they managed without anything apart from their talent of making babies. My mother bore nine babies; looking back, I can say that they did a good job in raising the seven of us. No, they did not sell the other two; they did not survive, unfortunately, as a result of her weak pregnancy.

I don’t consider him a disciplinarian. He never imposed his rules on us. But he supported us all the way. I don’t recall any value he imposed on me. He neither believes in corporal punishment. He left the job to my mother who on the other hand imposed on us her strict rules, like Presidential Decrees.

My father was never demonstrative of his affection. The last time he hugged me was when he came home after three years in Saudi Arabia which I did not reciprocate. I thought he was a stranger then.

But I never doubted his love. When I was hospitalized after I was severely beaten in a hazing, he took care of me: he fed me, bathe me, carried me form bed to toilet for almost a month when I was incapable.

I never kissed my father. I never hugged him. But that does not mean I love him less. I don’t know why it is so hard for me to do that. I blame it on society for imposing on us men, to be tough and that showing emotions is sign of weakness.

I wish I could buy him a Lazy Boy, and a wide screen LCD TV set so he could watch all his favorite TV comfortably.

I wish he could read this post now: Happy father’s day pa . I love you.