Let's set the wayback machine to February, 1999. I'm a graduate student working on my last year of my doctorate, I'm living with my ex-girlfriend (discussed elsewhere in this blog), and, in general, I feel like I had a good handle on what life was about.
All of that changed in the span of time it takes to read a two-line e-mail.
I still remember it clearly. I was working on a computer from our apartment in Tulsa, and I had checked my university e-mail account. There was a message from 'philipe.XXXX@yyyyzzz.fr' Spam has already been around for sometime, and I was about to hit the delete key, except that I had been receiving questions about my guitar tablature posts recently, and I've made some nice acquaintances from the other side of the world because of a kind reply. I knew the .fr meant France, so I hit 'Enter,' and waited for my slow connection to load the message. The e-mail was short, but devastating.
'Hello, my name is Jessica XXXX-MyLastName, and I was born in France in 1964. I'm looking for Denis YYYY MyLastName who was born in New York in 1941. Can you to help me?'
I knew for whom she was looking, and I knew what help she needed. The last name was the same as mine, and there could be only one reason why. At times, I have a detailed imagination, and it was interesting to see where my mind went in the ten seconds following the receipt of this message.
I'm a young girl in France, in school, looking at the rest of the children during parent's day, and wondering where my father is. Days pass, and repeatedly throughout my life I explain to people that my last name comes from an American father, and no, I haven't met him. I see random strangers in the street speaking English, and each time I wonder if it could be him looking for me, he looks like me, doesn't he? Men come and go in my life, and though I loved them, there is one whose face I still long to see, one person for whom I shed tears late at night when I'm alone, even though he is unaware of my existence. And all I know about him is that his name is Denis.
And that also made my reply to her short.
'He is my father, and I suspect that you are his daughter. If this is true, write me back. There is much to discuss.--Dennis'
I was stalling for time. I certainly needed to know more before we talked, but I also needed time to think. How do you tell someone that their father, ahem, has issues?
My relationship with my father has always been difficult. My parents divorced when I was three years old. When we lived in New York, my brother, Sean, and I would go to visit him and his new wife Robin on most weekends. During these times, I have to admit, we had a great time and he was as much of a father as a divorced dad could be. He taught us how to fish, took us to see Star Wars, watched car races with us, and in general was accessible for questions that sons ask their fathers.
All of this changed when we moved to California. We had left New York for a year, but throughout the whole time, he hardly ever called. After we returned to New York, our visits to him were more infrequent, often less than once a month. I don't recall us ever saying we didn't want to go.
After another year in New York, my mother had received a marriage proposal from my stepfather, and we moved to Oklahoma. The phone calls became infrequent, until he even started forgetting our birthdays. After a year in Oklahoma, he basically ignored us. At this time, he also stopped paying child support. My mom had offered to drop child support in lieu of him setting up a savings account for $100 a month so we could use the money to visit each summer. He said no, and didn't pay anyway. Mom let it go because she was married, but we were dirt poor because my stepfather was not what you would call an 'earner.'
We visited New York about four years later, and called my father to see how he was doing. He had divorced Robin and married another woman named Frannie at this time, but not after having another child with Robin. He must have been thinking about the child support payments because he was kissing our butts in a very large way. He bent over backwards saying how he wants to be part of our lives, if we wanted some tapes, etc.
Many people would think that I/we shouldn't regret the next action, but we definitely should have explained it better. We enforced the child support, and it pissed him off. He had to pay until we were 21. He complained, but then again, he didn't know I had only one pair of pants.
We visited two years later, I called him and said we'd like to see him. He replied, 'Why, did your mom want to bleed more money from me?' I said, 'Nevermind.' and hung up.
The rest of the relationship consisted of three phone calls for a few minutes each.
One could argue the child support issue was a reason for him to be angry (he chose not to see us when we came), so I can accept part of the blame for our problems. But he literally abandoned an earlier family, and never told anyone about them. And he had a daughter that he hasn't seen since a little after she was born.
"Shit!" I yelled, Christine asked what was the matter. Mildly giggling (in the most insane sort of giggles) I told her briefly what I just read. She was compassionate, and I was reminded of how she always says 'Everybody has an interesting family.' Her family is interesting, and indeed, mine is too.
I called my mother and asked her if she knew about this. She said no, and her first question was,
'Dennis, do you think he got a divorce?'
I didn't think about this, and I realized that it would really hurt her if the answer was no. I wondered if there was a way to set the clock back five minutes.
But it was too late. I replied already, and there was no turning back. I also had a feeling that this woman in France needed my help.
I told my mom that I didn't know about the divorce, but I would find out. I told her that I'm sorry, I wasn't expecting this. Neither did she.
The next day, I saw a reply from Jessica in my Inbox. It said...
-to be continued
Farewell Reader, have a good day.
Hussman
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