Have you ever felt guilty for not feeling more?

i remember the first time i went out with my father and actually enjoyed it.
i was like 8 and he took me to the zoo…

i vividly remember sitting on this huge turtle,
thinking it would move with me on it.
for once tho,
he wasn’t just this intimidating presence i was kind of scared of.
he was just my father and we were bonding.

I don’t think I’ve ever called this man Dad tbh.

for most of my life,
i barely knew him.
he was the guy who handled my upkeep:
haircuts,
school uniforms,
and the occasional outing to be around his adult friends.
he never taught me about life or for the conversations that mattered.
most of the time,
i was just something to show off to his friends.

I was a prop he hoped would follow in his footsteps.

today,
i learned he’s losing his mind.
“senile” is the word used.
i felt it when i tried to reconnect with him.
all he wanted to do was talk old beef with my mother and grandmother.
sometimes,
he would get so angry about it.
suddenly,
it made sense why his girlfriend was so eager for us to talk.

I should feel more,
right?

i should feel something deeper than this detached sadness,
but the truth is…

I still feel cold.
Why do i feel bad for feeling this way?

he never missed a birthday of mine but those felt cold with us.
his absence shaped me,
and now,
so does the realization that he was never really ready to be a father.
i do think he tried.
he pushed through his own barriers to see me,
even if he never quite figured out how to show up.
maybe that’s what lingers:

The wish that he had been different.

that i could’ve talked to him,
like,
really talked to him.
i thought i could until he admitted he’d lied about accepting me being gay.
i feel like i’ve had a complicated relationship with someone who was there,
but felt like a presence rather than a person.
a figure in my life rather than my father?
the person that is my father but the distance that made him the man who i never knew?

Maybe I’m sad about what was and what could have been?

i dunno.