I had a nightmare when I was six or seven. In hindsight it wasn’t particularly scary, but six year old me awoke in tears.
I was walking through pitch black – not even night – just blackness that negates every kind of light imaginable. At least I was not alone. With me, walking alongside me on either side were the Tin Man, The Scarecrow, The Lion, and Dorothy with Toto. Oh, and Jaws; we were in about a foot of water so he was cool.
We heard them rather than saw them, but it was unmistakable. The Flying Monkeys. Not the cute, dorky ones from the original Wizard of Oz, no. The badass, scary as fuck Flying Monkeys from The Wiz. They hit one after the other of us. First The Lion was whisked away. Then Tin Man. Then Scarecrow. Then Dorothy (and her little dog too).
They came for me over and over again. Jaws would attack every time they got close. Monkey blood and guts everywhere. Looking back, this is the horror movie I wish they’d make.
I woke up startled and crying. My dad came into my room to check on me and when I told him I’d had a nightmare he scooped me up into his arms.
You’re okay, mijo.’
I want my mom.
I know.
He held me closer. I pushed harder.
I want my mom!
I know.
I pushed and pushed and he held tight.
My pleas turned to anger and I finally screamed, I hate you, I want my mom! I pushed and punched, but he never let go.
As an adult I can logic it out. I was a unwanted, motherless child and my dad was the only safe place I had to lash out. I wasn’t a malicious person trying to hurt someone for the sake of hurting them.
But still.
He held me until I fell asleep (you fell A-SLEEP?).
Yes Rachel, I fell asleep.
Sometimes I think I woke up to him asleep next to me on my tiny twin bed. Sometimes I remember him asleep on the floor. I think the truth is my brain is making it up to protect me from that sort of self-loathing that creeps in from time to time. What I do know is I pushed and pulled and thrashed and that man was unrelenting in his hold on me.
The entirety of my childhood is peppered with scenes like this that only made sense long after I had grown the fuck up.
I was hard on my dad, boy. Too old and too smart at an early age for my own good. I got older and lost the excuse of being too young to know better and I hurt that man because I fucking had no place else to focus my rage. He was wiser than I ever gave him credit because he knew it was his job to be the harbor in the storms of my creating.
Don’t get it twisted, I am not saying my father was perfect. I am simply saying he was the perfect father for me. Anyone else would have been mince meat at my hands. I would have been a monster if left to my own devices. I guess what I am saying is: if there is anything good in me it’s from the man that made me.
I don’t think I am going to see him after this life. I don’t think he is reading this over my shoulder. I don’t believe in that kind of nonsense. In this life I will always be my father’s son.
I just like telling people how cool my dad was. I like that my dad was the kind of man who was hard, and scary, and the safest place in the world.
Postscript – I know I have told this story before. I will probably tell it again. Hopefully a little better.
