The Hands That Feed You

Growing up, I was forced to endure my father’s idea of funny.

This included acronyms for cars. We’re a Ford family, as well as NASCAR fanatics, so of course he used, First On Race Day. We aren’t big on Chevrolet, though: Crack Head, Every Valve Rattles, Oil Leak Every Time.

My dad also likes to play with words; “If you look up Dodge in the dictionary, it says: To avoid.” He loves that one, uses it all the time. He also gets a kick out of saying, “Yeah, y'all kids are real assets. You do nothin’ but set around on your ass all day.”

These are just a few of his favorites.

When I think of my father, fond memories are conjured. Specifically, the sign in his shop that reads “Smile, your on camera." And no, that wasn’t a spelling error on my part, the sign actually says “Your." One of his more irritating quirks was the way he would tell me about so-and-so, and I’d ask who so-and-so was, and he’d repeat the name, so-and-so, as if that gave me a clearer understanding of who they were. “Oh, you know, so-and-so, who’s truck I fixed last week…”

No. I did not know.

I remember his hands. I have a lot of respect for those hands. They’re swollen and cracked, the nails so short and embedded into his cuticles that they seem to be a part of his skin. Those hands cradled me when I was a baby, whooped my butt when I was a little devil, and wiped my tears away through the divorce.

That was easily the worst night of my life. So far. I won’t go into detail about it, but I’ll tell you this; My momma looking me in the eyes when I was 13 and telling me that she was leaving my dad was the first time in my life I’d blinked and wondered if I was dreaming. Because surely this wasn’t real.

I find it immensely annoying that the experience of divorce is often belittled for kids, mainly by other kids. I would go to school and attempt to speak to my close friends about it. The ones who had experienced separation spoke to me as if my parents were already divorced, even though at the time I was certain they would work it out. These friends did not do much to comfort me. The ones who hadn’t dealt with divorce acted like it was no big deal. It happens to every other kid, after all, and most of them are fine now.

My experience was belittled by my parents, too. They wouldn’t appreciate me saying that, but it’s true. When I tried to speak to my momma about it, she would cry and act like the weight of the world was on her shoulders. I’m sure it felt that way, but her getting upset, throwing her hands in the air, and going, “I guess it’s all my fault, the whole divorce, I can’t do anything right.” didn’t make it easier on me. I felt I couldn’t tell her, honestly, how I felt without being sent on a guilt trip. I was very angry with her for a very long time, and that resentment is something I still struggle with now.

My dad was also very angry with her. He still is. I think he always will be. The truth is, he’s always been an angry person. That’s why I was scared of him as a child. He was the one who spanked us. He was the one who yelled at us when we did something wrong. He was big, strong, and mean. That was how I saw my father for the longest time, and this makes me tremendously sad now. The period of his separation from my momma was eye opening.

At first, it was very difficult. He wanted me to pick his side. I can at least vouch for my momma that she seemed genuinely guilty about what had transpired, and she didn’t push my brother and I, or try to incriminate my dad.

Dad, however, was eager to place blame. He told me about all of her problems, all the sins she’s committed against him, and I know he wasn’t lying. But I didn’t wanna hear it. I shouldn’t have heard it. I remember holding my hands over my ears and holding back tears and repeating redundantly, uselessly, “I don’t want to hear it”. He never listened. I don’t think he started listening until my aunt chewed him out.

That was the worst of it. Not being able to tell them how I felt, listening to them fight, feeling alone in all of it. My younger, older brother wasn’t emotionally invested in their marriage, he was too consumed by the computer screen, and my oldest brother was out of the house. He didn’t hear the arguments, and he didn’t have to pack his bags and move back and forth every week. He didn’t live in Jan and Roy’s basement that momma rented out, he didn’t stay with us in the tiny camper without hot water, and he didn’t come to eventually live with my grandparents. He did not watch my mother date and become engaged to a much older, very ill, man who had already been married four times. He simply attended the wedding and participates in small talk with the guy at family functions. He did not endure the awkward dinners with my dad and his girlfriend, who he is no longer seeing and I actually grew to like, and even admire. I know my brother still hurt from it, though, and even the younger one was vaguely annoyed by our parents’ childishness. The oldest was moving out around the time they separated. He told me not long after the news hit, “One weekend I was home and I had a family, and the next I was gone and just didn’t.” But he wasn’t there, and neither was my other brother, really. I was alone. It might sound like victimization to say it was harder for me than it was my siblings, but that's truly how it felt. I am the most emotional of us kids, the most compassionate, and my parents recognized immediately that I was the one they would compel to sympathize with them through targeting my vulnerability. My mom did this through guilt. My dad through brutal honesty. And it was very brutal.

There was a sort of attitude, on my momma’s side of the family, that my dad wouldn’t survive without her. I think that’s why she left. I’d be lying if I said he was a fantastic husband, but then she wasn’t a fantastic wife. She left because she wanted him to fall to his knees, beg for her forgiveness, and realize that he couldn’t live without her. She is very romantic.

My dad is not. She was naive to think he would respond that way. It was as if she didn’t know him at all. If she thought he needed her, then he was going to prove he didn’t. I’m still watching him prove her wrong today.

My dad was shockingly maternal during the separation. While the beginning was bumpy and rough, and the years after that bumpy and rough in certain aspects as well, it brought on a different side to him. Suddenly, he was assigning us chores, asking us to help him out around the house. He bought a book called 101 Crock Pot Recipes. He made sure that my brother and I knew we could talk to him.

Sure, the Crock Pot phase didn’t last long, we ordered a pizza at least once a week, and the sink eventually filled up with dishes as we slacked on the chores. And yeah, his insistence on painting the walls blue and pulling up trees in the yard had a midlife ring to it, but his coping was mild compared to my momma’s. She was extremely emotional and began making questionable decisions. She took up smoking again, she started drinking more, she got a tattoo, she got a new car, she got an old boyfriend who had been given a year to live.

My momma isn’t a strong woman. I love her, and I see her as a friend in many ways, but she has never been a great maternal influence in my life. I have never looked at her and wished to be like her.

When I look at my father, however, I am overwhelmed with pride. Usually.

Divorce, if anything, makes you realize that your parents are people as well. Like us, they are not perfect. My dad can be too harsh. Not very thoughtful in his wording, sometimes. Too honest.

But he doesn’t know a stranger. He is a terrible businessman because he’s too nice and wants to make everyone a deal. Even though he earns maybe half of what my momma makes, he kept up our big house when she left. Meanwhile, our weeks with her were spent in a smattering of places that brought on a feeling of dread.

Many people don’t agree with his methods. Sometimes I myself do not. Getting my butt popped instilled a healthy dose of respect in me. I didn’t get spanked very often, but when I was, he made sure I knew that it was not out of anger, but to give me an understanding that actions have consequences. There is a difference between discipline and abuse. Between fear of doing something wrong and knowing that I will be punished, and fear of getting hit to the point that I am in physical pain. I have never been afraid of being beaten by my father. I have been afraid of disappointing him. I feared the shame, not his hands. That is the contrast. Getting spanked worked with me. It did not work with my brother. My father recognized this, and began to remove video games and the computer cord until he did what he was told.

Despite the pain I felt, and the issues I still struggle with as far intimacy and my need to attain power and wear the pants in relationships, I’m glad my parents separated. I am certain that if my momma hadn’t left, I still would not know how to wash my own clothes, I would not have under cooked chicken while attempting to make a meal, and I would not recognize what a great man my father is. I am a spiritual person. I believe in fate, to an extent. I believe my parents were meant to fall in love and have a family together. I do not believe that they were meant to grow old together.

Apparently, they weren't meant to have an easy going daughter, either. I used to think I was the black sheep of my family. I am surrounded by conservatives, mainly on my momma’s side. While my dad’s family is made up of Democrats, most of them are closet Republicans. I, however, am very, sometimes annoyingly, liberal. Now, I am very appreciative that I was born in the south, surrounded by God fearing, traditional people, like my grandparents. My grandparents, my momma’s parents, are two of the best human beings in the whole world. They would give a stranger a kidney, that’s just who they are, and I know it stems from their faithfulness and love of Jesus.

I am not like my family, though. I am not very religious. I do not always enjoy church. I find that preachers have a tendency to twist their political views into the sermon. For example, during the Brett Kavanaugh Vs. Dr. Ford incident, the preacher told us all to open our bibles to Genesis. He told us about a story I’d already read on my own, but now saw through his perspective. It was basically about a man who was accused of rape and then later went on to become a prime minister. He slyly, almost unnoticeable in his scheming, slipped the idea into our minds that women can’t always be trusted, so we get to thinking, Why should Dr. Ford? Churches, not all churches, but a lot, have a quiet corruptness in them. I am often made to feel inferior or unchristian for my beliefs when I go. This superiority complex many Christians have stunts the growth of a progressive, accepting nation. Yet, the bible is a book filled with love and forgiveness and kindness. Basing our laws on the concept of religion is a form of oppression, but the majority of America, being Christian, does not realize this or care.

Originally, I assumed that I possessed more moderate opinions due to my aunt. She is considerably liberal, and became my best friend somehow through the divorce. I love her to pieces, and view her in much the same way I view my dad. His other sister said once on a beach trip to said favorite aunt, “I think [her parents] had her for you.” It really does feel that way.

The more I get to know my dad, though, the more I am opened up to what an accepting person he really is. Dad is one of the few southerners I know who does not vote based on party. While he leans toward the conservative side, he has shocked me with his liberal views of abortion, and his agreement with my stance regarding Brett Kavanaugh, Bill Clinton, and Donald Trump. While he occasionally spouts out a comment that sounds somewhat racist, I have learned to grimace and ignore it. The truth is, he buys into stereotypes. He does not treat colored people any differently than white people, but he does look at them differently. It’s how he was raised, and while I know this is not an excuse for small-mindedness, I am also aware that he will never change his views and strong willed opinions. So what makes me so appreciative of him? He raised me to treat my elders with respect, and to love and be kind to everyone I meet. He raised me to be tough and strong, bragging to people about how I worked circles around my brothers, and smoked all the boys in soapbox races. He inadvertently made me the open-minded feminist I am today. He accidentally raised a liberal. I realize now that favoring my aunt did not make me liberal; I favored my aunt because I am liberal.

Everything about myself that I am proud of, originated in my father's basic principles. I have watched my mother and my grandmother coddle people who they love for fear of hurting them. Thankfully, dad taught me not to put up with anyone’s crap. He taught me that loving someone and enabling them are very different things. That is one of the most important lessons you could ever learn. You know, I’d hate to see what a spoiled brat I would be today without my dad. I’m already a spoiled brat, so I can only imagine what a monster I’d be had he not been there to influence me with his tough love. I’ve seen people, people who call themselves my loved ones, walk all over my sweet, precious grandparents, taking advantage of their kindness, stealing from them, manipulating them, disrespecting them. I don’t know how they sleep at night.

I know how my dad, sleeps, though. Exhausted, with a stiff neck and sore back. Mind heavy with sleep, having gone to work much too early and returned much too late. He makes sacrifices like this every day to support us, to put a roof over our heads and food in our stomachs. He closes his eyes, knowing there is more work to do, but also with a sense of entitlement, aware that he has earned the right to a good night’s sleep.

My dad taught me the importance of hard work, and the importance of friendship. To be kind to someone even if you don’t see eye to eye. He taught me that family isn’t blood. As I watched his lip quiver at my grandfather’s funeral, he taught me what it was to be strong; He taught me what a real man looked like.

And as he taught me how to race my little, pink soapbox car, he also taught me how to live my life. Take a few losses, work your way out of the losers bracket, wish the other guy luck. Most importantly, do your best.

I love my dad. I love his acronyms, and jokes, and grammar, and southern drawl, and the spare tire in his belly, and the smell of oil that’s always attached to him, and the way he pops Tums like they’re tic tacs, and the fact that I look just like him. The harsh nose. The round, blue eyes. The square jaw and crinkly eyed smile. I am my father’s daughter.

And I have so much respect for his hands. His swollen knuckles, and scars. They are a map of his life, a map you can trace through the cracks and creases all the way back to when he started working for my grandpa as a kid. They are a testament to how dedicated he is to that God awful auto body shop. The shop that I watch slowly suck the life out of him every day, adding fire to that perpetual anger in his chest. I pray for him, and his rough, mechanic hands. I hope you will, too.