Funerals and Ties...

In my previous post, I gave a bit of an introduction to my mother. As her only living child, I had no biological siblings growing up. My stepfather, however, had a son and daughter, both significantly older than I.

His daughter, who at twenty, met my mother and I for the first time, must have taken me to heart from the first. She kept in touch via letters and cards, and always sent me gifts at holidays and remembered my birthday each year, despite eventually being a busy mother of three.

When we met, I was a skinny six-year-old who loved being outside; My favourite place was the beach, and it was on one weekend outing that my soon-to-be step dad introduced a pretty blond on a visit from her university, to my mother and I.

We spent time walking the beach and swimming in the waves. The last thing I remember about that day was riding home in his convertible, top down, feeling the sun on my face. I had no idea then that I would one day be the one to break the news of her father's death to her; I also did not foresee announcing to him that she had called while he was out, and that he had a new granddaughter.

He also had a son, whom we saw only sporadically since we were three thousand miles beyond the U.S. in another part of the world. I first met him when he was in high school and came to visit his father during the summer. I was about ten then and watched a series of events unfold with what I now understand to be dismay.

Being old-school Army, my step dad took one look at his son, and carted him off to the nearest barber, protests notwithstanding. This did nothing to endear father to son, and the two months spent away from friends and his mother and adored stepfather, in an office working a summer job, only heightened festering dislike.

It never occurred to my stepfather that constant sarcasm and criticism would wear away whatever fragile bonds existed between he and his children, or that as adults they might repudiate his role in their lives entirely. He felt justified in demanding deference and appropriate behavior, as he had from troops, not realising that such strategies do not work in the home.

While my mother was aware of this and very nearly wore herself out trying to reason with her husband, the behaviour continued. In my teens, I too became the target of vicious humour, sometimes from both parents, and learned to lie low, keep quiet and avoid either one unless absolutely necessary. I became the resident bookworm. With no-one to help, I learnt the art of the poker face, all the while roiling inwardly.

My stepfather was at his best when travelling, something we did a lot of as a threesome. I saw Paris, Brussels, London and other cities in Europe, learnt about beetles indigenous to the tropical rain forest, tasted berries grown in volcanic soil and spent time helping kids in a Colombian hospital, none of which would have been possible without my stepfather.

When he turned his attention to impending retirement, my stepfather, who would have been happy to find a place abroad, faced stiff lipped expletives from his wife, and back to the States we came, I first to university and they to a condominium on the water.

Though we saw his adult children and grandchildren portions of the summers during my teens, relations remained strained. With his death in 1982 at 58, we were freed from walking on eggshells, but it would be many years until I grasped the depth of resentment and hurt that he left as a legacy in his children.

While I have long since forgiven each of my parents their mistakes, and still work daily on forgiving myself and others, apparently my stepfathers' children avoided any mention of him, no longer referring to him as dad, but only by name, and only when necessary.

This was evident in the recent obituary, written about his son, that omitted any mention of his father or any step sibling. While another might take offence, I see it as a sign of longstanding hurt, something that I cannot mend.

As I prepare for the impending burial of a fifty-six-year-old man who was sometimes as stubborn as his father but never as critical or mean, I marvel at ties and their duration and evolution over time and distance.

He leaves behind nieces, nephews, many friends and professional associates, a fiancee, sister, and brother-in-law, a great-niece and great-nephews a stepfather and lastly, a step sibling, all of whom will miss a nice guy.

I will stand with his sister, the pretty blond I met over forty years ago as a youngster, and say the Mourner's Kaddish with others as we say goodbye.