Family Adrift

We had a sailboat, an old Surfwind - like a Sunfish, only bigger, with blue and white sails. We didn’t sail in Cleveland but hauled that boat to Michigan every summer where we kept a cottage on Glen Lake. It was idyllic. Dad loved to sail. He’d disappear onto the water for hours. We’d go with him sometimes, but I think he preferred the solitude. It was his time to be alone and think and put the pieces of his life in perspective.

Dad led a double life. I didn’t know he’d been married before. I didn’t know he’d had three children with his first wife and he’d given them up to be with our mom. My brother Rich, and I were oblivious.

It wasn’t his choice to give up his first family. Actually it was a choice he made. My sister says he was weak. That’s hard for me to square with because he represented sanity. He was the voice of reason when mom was anything but. His young daughters lost their anchor after the divorce and when he passed away in 1992, Rich and I lost ours.

I found pictures of him with my sister’s children. It’s surreal to realize a man you’ve known all your life, has another story. It’s hard to bring those different pictures into focus. I couldn’t imagine him sharing the sailboat with other children. But he did.

Since his passing, I’ve come to know my sisters. I’ve built a relationship with them, sharing stories and remembering the flawed and wholly human who was our dad. It’s taken half a lifetime to recognize the fragility of our boat and tenuous lines tying us together. They haven’t cut me loose. They’ve pulled me in, like a sail and together we are facing into the wind.