How Do You Say Goodbye To A Stranger?

I found out a few weeks ago that my biological father died. When my mom told me the news, I was a little stunned at first. She shared the info with me over text message, as we were both working. She apologized for telling me via text, but she wasn't sure how else to tell me.

I was going to say that my father and I had a complicated relationship, but the truth is, we didn't have a relationship at all. Having that thought, after just finding out that he had died, made me incredibly sad and I burst into tears. I wasn't expecting to have that kind of reaction, but there I was, uncontrollably crying over a man who was essentially a stranger to me. I laid down and cried for about an hour, and then I had to get back to work.

The truth is that my father was a stranger to me my whole life. And now I'm left wondering, how do you say goodbye to a stranger? Well, technically, I said goodbye to him when I was 17 years old. That was the last time I saw him, and so really, that's when I said goodbye.

My parents were just babies when I was born. My mom was 17 and my dad was 21. I can only imagine how hard it was to raise a baby when they were so young themselves. My mom assures me that my father loved me, and that he took good care of me, but it's hard for me to recall those memories from so long ago. 

I was 6 years old when my parents got divorced. My father disappeared for a few years, and when he came back, I would see him on occasion. This continued until I was around 11 years old. He always worked odd jobs and never had enough money. I remember my mom giving him money at the start of my weekend with him, to make sure he had enough for the train ride and to feed me.

We spent our weekends together at the boarding house where he lived. It was for men only; a place where rooms were rented by the week or by the month. It was a place with strange men, and for a little girl, not the ideal situation. I told my mom that going there made me uncomfortable and she let me make the decision to not go back.

My father disappeared again, and for the next handful of years, I would hear from him a handful of times. One time it was a random letter asking me for forgiveness (he was working the 12 steps), another time it was a random card on my birthday, but usually it was a letter from my grandma who would mention that he had stopped by to say hello. And then he would disappear again.

He got in touch when I was 17 years old and asked if I would meet him for lunch. My high school boyfriend drove me to meet him. We met at a hot dog place around the corner from that same boarding house, where he still lived. He asked me basic questions about what I had been up to over the years, he asked how my family was, he asked about school. The hour that we spent together wasn't nearly long enough for him to really learn anything about me. We said our awkward goodbyes and that was it. That was the last time I ever saw him.

I went on to grow up and live a whole life that didn't include him.  A life that he knew nothing about. I graduated high school, went to college, got a great job, got married, had babies, bought a house, got divorced and he never knew about any of it. He never met my husband. He never met his only grandbabies. I don't know that he ever even saw a picture of them. I'm getting sad now, as I'm saying these things out loud. But I wasn't sad back then. I hardly ever thought about Freddie Patrick. 

These few weeks since I got the news have been busy. I quit my longtime job to chase my dreams of writing and so I've been busy adjusting to that. I have thought about my father a few times and have had some mixed emotions about the whole thing. It doesn't make sense to be sad over someone I didn't know, yet I have been sad. I've also been a little bit mad. Mad that I will never know what he did with his life. Mad that he never knew anything about mine. Mad that he didn't try harder. Mad that he didn't battle whatever haunted him and prevented him from being a good dad. Mad that I won't have the answers to so many questions. 

Anger gets me nowhere, and so my only choice is to do what I've done many times before. I'm letting him go. And I'm letting go of what could have been, but never was. I'm letting go of a stranger and I'm saying goodbye.