Selves

FATHER: “You know what?”

DAUGHTER: “What?”

FATHER: “I’ll always take care of you. Always.”

DAUGHTER: “Always?”

FATHER: “No matter what.”

DAUGHTER: “No matter what?”

FATHER: “Yes. No matter.”

DAUGHTER: “But you don’t know that, you know?”

FATHER: “OK. I don’t know that. Not for real.”

DAUGHTER: “You fail at times.”

FATHER: “Of course.”

DAUGHTER: “You’re not perfect.”

FATHER: “No-one is.”

DAUGHTER: “I love you.”

FATHER: “Of course you do. I love you too.”

DAUGHTER: “And you can hurt me.”

FATHER: “And I can be hurt, too.”

DAUGHTER: “You can be cruel.”

FATHER: “Yes. I know.”

DAUGHTER: “And unkind.”

FATHER: “Of course.”

DAUGHTER: “And inconsistent.”

FATHER: “Yes. Yes to all of the above. But that’s not me. That’s my other self.”

DAUGHTER: “Other…?”

FATHER: “Yes, other. It’s not the one talking now. Not the one talking today.”

DAUGHTER: “So. Why?”

FATHER: “It’s the same as my mother’s other self. Your Grammy. Or my brother. Your uncle. We have selves that we wish we could contain but fear will get out on their own. And do bad things in our names.”

DAUGHTER: “Family history?”

FATHER: “Yes. Unspoken history that every family has and no family admits.”

DAUGHTER: “Skeletons in the closet?”

FATHER: “Yup.”

DAUGHTER: “Like?”

FATHER: “Well, I used to describe it as Mon roulette. Every morning when I got up. Which Mom will I find in the kitchen when I came down before school?”

DAUGHTER: “Which?”

FATHER: “Sure. Which. Pick one. There was quite a list. The loving mom. The spiteful mom. The resentful mom. The hateful mom. The ‘I’m not your nigger servant’ mom. That was quite the laugh and a half!”

DAUGHTER: “Sounds horrible.”

FATHER: “Sounds typical.
DAUGHTER: “Fifties family?”
FATHER: “A mom for all seasons.”

DAUGHTER: “Fuck.”
FATHER: “Sure. And all reasons. None of which made sense.”

DAUGHTER: “I can’t imagine.”

FATHER: “Oh. And you have your own family history. Your own selves.”

DAUGHTER: “My own skeletons?”

FATHER: “Why should you escape?”

DAUGHTER: “I know. I’ve talked to my cousins. We’ve seen. We’ve spoken.”

FATHER: “I know you have. Of course you have. You can’t have not. They’ve both spoken to me as well.”

DAUGHTER: “Really?”

FATHER: “On and off.”

DAUGHTER: “About?”

FATHER: “About what it was like growing up. Why their family was the way it was. How they felt it was all their fault. Typical stuff. American Dysfunction.”

DAUGHTER: “Yah.”

FATHER: “Yah, ‘Yah.’ But then there’s you, for that matter. You. “

DAUGHTER: “Me?”

FATHER: “Yes, you. You have an other self. A self that you are not proud of. A self that does not operate under your authority nor by your leave. A self. A selfish self. A self that is there, none-the-less. Under your self. It is your self. Yourself.”

DAUGHTER: “Oh.”

FATHER: “Yes. Oh.

DAUGHTER: “But-“

FATHER: Myself. Not the self I choose to be. But the self I am to be. Whether I like it or fucking not. Well. One of my selves. We are legion.”

DAUGHTER: “What do we do with all of these selves?”

FATHER: “Deal with them. One at a time.”

DAUGHTER: “That’s it?”

FATHER: “What else? We are the only selves we have. And the only self we can give to someone else’s self. And someone else’s self out there will take our self. And we will take that someone else’s self as well. Their selves. Their many selves, the good and the bad. A self for a self. Selves unveiled. Flawed. Imperfect. But maybe beloved. A self united.”

DAUGHTER: “What do you do then? How can I trust someone who isn’t always the same?”

FATHER: “Trust yourself. Yourselves. And trust in the selves of others. And forgive. One self at a time.”

DAUGHTER: “Do you trust?”

FATHER: “It’s hard. I try. I fail.”

DAUGHTER: “How?”

FATHER: “First, I trust life.”

DAUGHTER: “And then what?”

FATHER: “Then I usually make a mess of it. I fail miserably.”

DAUGHTER: “And then what?”

FATHER: “I try again.”

DAUGHTER: “Oh. Does that work?”

FATHER: “I’ll let you know when I’m done.”

DAUGHTER: “I trust you.”