Repentance 2.0

“Repentance”

            As I stared at the pristine and well-kept body of my Uncle David in his casket, my blank face belied how much I hated him at the time. I had not known who my Uncle David was, until my parents had informed me, my father holding back his tears as best he could, about his untimely passing due to a heart condition. He was my fathers younger brother, a member of my family, and yet I didn’t feel anything. I understood the reality of death perfectly, and I knew just how badly it effected people and how one is expected to act towards such news, but an eight year old hardly has the capacity to truly mourn a family member they’ve never met. As cruel as it may have looked from an outside perspective, I took the news that we would be attending his funeral at the Woodley family home in Shreveport with displeasure and annoyance.

            “Why should I have to leave home for somebody I don’t even know?” Those were my unspoken thoughts as my mother and I packed my bags for the trip. I knew the answer was simple, “He was family, we have to go” but I never thought of nor knew him as family. In my mind, my family consisted of my mom, my dad, my sister, and our housekeeper and that’s all I needed. I barely had any relationship with my extended family, and our trips to Shreveport to see the rest of the Woodley family were rare and I couldn’t really remember any of my Uncles, Aunts, or Cousin’s.

            My father worked at the time for Nestle and was often traveling, so I was unused to him being around the house very much but was quite used to making the most out of the time he was home. I always wanted us to play together, experience things together, and just have time together as father and son in such a way that it was like he’d never been gone at all. And while after my Uncles’ death he was home for more than usual, he never had any time for me. On some days he’d just be in his room all day working or sleeping and I was explicitly told not to go in. Other days he’d be on the phone, talking to various, nameless family members and I was left staring at him longingly, waiting for a turn that never came. I barely had time with my dad anyway, and now it felt like he was being taken away by my Uncle, this person I had never met.

            As I often did, I brought my concerns to my mother, who could only reply, matter of factly, that “Uncle David was really important to Daddy.” But wasn’t I important? Wasn’t spending time with me, making up for all those weeks he was gone, also as vitally important?  When you’re a kid, at least in my case, you can feel so self-righteous and indignant towards things, believing you have the right to be the most important thing in the universe that you can’t stand to see otherwise. As innocent as children can be, they can be just as rotten if pushed a certain way or if they’re not given what they want or demand.

            And before I knew it, we were at the airport waiting for our plane to be ready. Excited kids bounced around in their seats, some running around while their parents chided them, adults sitting patiently as adults tend to do, and I was simply sitting at our seat staring blankly at my father next to me. He had been wearing the same expression for weeks, but only now could I truly describe it. It was a face that conveyed loss, that a part of his whole as a person had been forcibly ripped from him well before he was ready to part with it, and the life moving forward around him just seemed empty. I watched him, praying silently that he’d look in my direction, give me that genuine smile of his and talk to me like he always has. But he never did.

            I can say for a fact that the airplane ride to Shreveport was the best part of the entire trip, if only for the fact that I had a new game for my Gameboy and a Power Rangers playset to keep both my mind entertained and my imagination flowing. But even the toys and games couldn’t stray my mind away from the issue that was plaguing me, and I hoped in earnest that things would improve when we arrived and settled down in Shreveport. But it didn’t. My father continued to ignore me in favor of his brothers and sisters, whose names and faces became jumbled up as I kept being introduced to them one after another. Anita, Joe, Paul, Cecilia… they were all just names that came in one ear and instantly out the other in quick succession. I didn’t care for this onset of family members, nor did I care for the cousins who formed their own cliques and left me behind. All I wanted was for my father to look at me, and spend that quality father/son time with me that a father is supposed to do.

            With repeated denials of my desires and it appearing as though it was bound to continue, I acted in the natural way for a eight-year old: I threw tantrums for attention. Well, a tantrum might be a misnomer for my actions at Shreveport, because at that age I could be very destructive when angered.  I felt like I was in a competition for my dad’s affection against people who could somehow capture his attention at the slightest word, whether it be my extended family making small talk or just the mere mention of my Uncle David, and so I acted in such a way that I knew he’d pay attention to me. I deliberately appeared to be in a bad mood, mouths blown up to such a degree that a pufferfish would find it commendable, as mute as those Blue-Men group fellows on T.V., and adding a distinct hint of rage to my voice to convey to others that I was not someone to be approached. But my parents would always know what I really wanted, that all I really needed was for someone to listen to me and give me affection and I’d be back to my normal self in no time.

            But it didn’t work; at least not on the one person I wanted it to effect. My father continued with his daily routine of speaking to his brothers and sisters, likely discussing past memories of Uncle David that I had little care for. Laughing one second and holding back tears in the next, their reminiscing contained an aspect of joy that I had lost in recent days. My mother paid attention to me of course, but she couldn’t provide the fatherly attention I wanted and merely gave numerous unsatisfying reasons as to why my father was busy. And so I continued being a brat, a cold, angry, and uninspired brat, and then I believe karma answered in kind. The trip took a major turn for the worse as I received numerous injuries, from sprains, to accidentally falling off a high clubhouse, and even being assaulted by a chicken. It was as if god were trying to punish me for my outburst in such a time of mourning and yet it did not stop me. I only began to feel even more hatred towards the person who had posthumously caused all of this to happen: my Uncle David.

            In retrospect, a boy who had never truly suffered a major familial loss could never have understood what his father, or his extended family was going through. I had always had my sister, my housekeeper, and my two parents close by, so despite understanding death, I had never felt the pain of it. I had been sad about losing things sure, but it was always for material and trivial objects. Maybe in some regards my father was more human than I was at that age.

            And so came my uncle’s funeral where I, bitter and aggravated, asked my father if I could see his body so that I may finally see the face of the person whom I’d come to hate. My Uncle David didn’t look very different from most men, maybe different from my father, but he certainly didn’t fit the demonic image my seven year old mind came up with. That of a horny devil in ridiculous garb of cape and armor, laughing from some far away location as I suffered for his sake and to his pleasure. I remained eerily quiet and detached throughout the procession and the ride to the graveyard, refusing to care anymore about this tribute to the man who had stolen my father.

            I was then reminded of my Grandmother’s funeral, specifically something said to me there. I was far, far younger at the time, and was not prepared mentally for the long and arduous nature of a funeral. I was a boy used to running around in the grass and actively playing, not long speeches and services by priests. What I remember distinctly is coming out of the funeral crying because of how terrible I had felt about sitting around and not being allowed to do anything, and a priest came up to me and said “I am sorry for your loss” as if he believed I was crying over my Grandmother. At the time I thought of just how appropriate the line would be at this funeral, while now I can only feel the bitter irony stinging at my heart in both instances.

After the main procession we headed with the Casket to the graveyard. I walked around the graveyard, passing by grave after grave, sometimes strafing to and thro to amuse myself, and then I saw my father standing in front of a grave. He took note of my presence immediately, and looked at me with a sincere and almost tired smile that I hadn’t seen in what felt like ages. He asked me how I was and I answered him, in the same, subtly gruff tone, that I was okay. There were sounds of birds in the air as well as flowers flying about, and the grass smelled fresh and nice. My father had finally spoken to me, but it did not feel like the victory I had craved. I honestly expected the conversation to end there, but instead my father began talking about my Uncle and what an experience this had been for him.

“Your Uncle David… he had a lot of problems, problems he was trying to deal with on his own so no one would worry. He wanted to be okay for all the people who cared about him, his family, all his fans… he was a Quaterback for the Miami Dolphins, and he was really popular. We had to make this a private funeral just so they wouldn’t all swarm around here. Oh God… I remember David and I running that paper route together as kids, and how we’d always…always get up early in the morning to do it. Then we’d practice football together at school and he’d be off to practice with his team. It was just, just a lot of good times. Your Uncle was a great person. Do you remember the first time you met him? That time he came over with Grandma to our house?”

            That specific phrase struck a chord with me. I had actually met him before? “The two of you really got along. I remember all that time you spent together watching T.V. and talking in British Accents.” I remembered a point in my history eerily similar to that, and I recalled it as one of the best and most enjoyable nights of my life, but the name of the adult I had spent it with remained a blur. My brain stopped working immediately and shifted all focus to recreating the image of that man, and as my father was left on the verge of tears, I realized in horror that the adult and my Uncle David were one in the same. It was an instance when my Uncle had visited us with my Grandmother, and he and I had spent a long time together talking, watching cartoons and speaking to each other in British accents as if we were members of the Beatles.

            My face was left agape by the revelation that two adults, one who I had loved very much as a child, and one who I had come to hate with unjustified anger, were the same men. As I continued to stare at the crying face of my father, I realized just how much of a monster I had been to people completely undeserving. My Uncle was not the villain of this story, for I had taken the role myself out of misguided spite.  I had been selfish and cruel to people I loved and a man who I had once immensely respected. It was in that instance, that very instance, that I wanted to die, to atone, to never have to see my father and feel the shame of what I’ve done or worse, risk that he’d look at me with shame.

            I was completely passive on the trip back home, and I silently crawled to my bedroom carrying a guilt unbeknownst to the rest of my family. I lay on my bed and reflected on my sins and how much the pain of that trip had been well deserved. My fathers love and attention were now like the blessings of an angel that were undeserved to a demon such as myself. I recalled my Uncle David’s face, his plain, blank face in his deep, deep sleep. How could I repent? How could I ever make up for what I’ve done?

            It was then that I came to a decision, one to atone for my actions by being a better person than I had ever been before. Never again would I let my selfish desires negatively impact another, nor would I let ignorance cause me to make a terrible mistake. I would always try to be a genuinely good person, even when it came at a disadvantage to me, and improve on my negative qualities. It was honestly the type of life-changing wish a kid could make in a second and then just give up in a week out of fatigue, and even now I’m not sure whether I’ve really accomplished anything or made up for my mistakes. But I still remember that funeral, I still remember that face, and I always remember to keep trying to make up for it.