In a voicemail from my mother, I was told my father died last Friday.
To any other person, this news would be earth-shattering. To me, it's inconsequential.
Unless you know the whole story, that statement would seem heartless; cruel even. What you don't know is that for the entire 21 years of my existance I have been fatherless. I never had a relationship with the man, I never even met him. He makes up half of my DNA and that's all I have of him.
When I was a bun in the oven he left my mother high and dry. He wanted her to get an abortion. She refused. He had other even more ghastly plans for my infant self (I refuse to say what that plan was for the sake of my own mental safety. It's something I wish I didn't even know).
He was a smoker and an alcoholic. He had heart problems and needed a pace maker.
I wish I could say more about him. Wish I could say that he, on a few occasions, had thought to send me a birthday card. That he had thought to call my mother to ask her how I was. How I was growing.
No. I got nothing. I got nothing but the child support the state and the court made him give me.
I could go to the service and try to explain the black sheep relationship I have with his family. I could cry my eyes out for a man I never knew, but it just doesn't seem feasible. When my mother first called me about a month ago to tell me he was in the hospital and probably wouldn't make it, I cried. I cried for a man I never knew. I suddenly had emotions and feelings where before there was a void.
How can one have such strong emotions for a person they never met?
I thought about tracking him down on a few occasions. Finding his phone number to call him and make him aware of the fact that I knew he was a scumbag who didn't want anything to do with his youngest child.
I could have. I wanted to. I didn't. It wouldn't have changed anything. It wouldn't have changed the fact that he didn't care.
He was a lousy father. I want to believe I'm better off without him, but the "what if" factor creeps into the back of my head and that makes it hard to believe.
I included his obituary to prove just how little I mattered.
SALISBURY -- Albert Shattuck, 58, died June 25, 2010, at Concord Hospital after a long illness.
He was born April 26, 1952, in Bradford to Winifred and Edward Shattuck.
He worked for RH White Construction in Merrimack for 20 years. He was an avid outdoorsman who enjoyed hunting and fishing. He loved his children and grandchildren. He was an accomplished woodworker.
IN HIS LIFE: Family members included his loving wife of 21 years, Cherry (Edmiston) Shattuck; two sons, Louis Wilks of Loudon and A.J. Shattuck of Newmarket; two daughters, Wendy Pavnick of Salisbury, and Belinda Pelletier of Franklin; four granddaughters, Elizabeth, Emily, Jaylyn and Christina; four brothers, Allen, Edward, Timothy Shattuck and Richard Ingalls; and four sisters, Peggy Ames, Nina Gillcash, Nancy Blidberg and Judy Mason. He is predeceased by a brother, Jack Shattuck.
SERVICES: A memorial gathering is Wednesday from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. at the Cremation Society of New Hampshire, 172 King St., Boscawen. Relatives and friends invited to attend.
Is it better to lose something you never had?
To any other person, this news would be earth-shattering. To me, it's inconsequential.
Unless you know the whole story, that statement would seem heartless; cruel even. What you don't know is that for the entire 21 years of my existance I have been fatherless. I never had a relationship with the man, I never even met him. He makes up half of my DNA and that's all I have of him.
When I was a bun in the oven he left my mother high and dry. He wanted her to get an abortion. She refused. He had other even more ghastly plans for my infant self (I refuse to say what that plan was for the sake of my own mental safety. It's something I wish I didn't even know).
He was a smoker and an alcoholic. He had heart problems and needed a pace maker.
I wish I could say more about him. Wish I could say that he, on a few occasions, had thought to send me a birthday card. That he had thought to call my mother to ask her how I was. How I was growing.
No. I got nothing. I got nothing but the child support the state and the court made him give me.
I could go to the service and try to explain the black sheep relationship I have with his family. I could cry my eyes out for a man I never knew, but it just doesn't seem feasible. When my mother first called me about a month ago to tell me he was in the hospital and probably wouldn't make it, I cried. I cried for a man I never knew. I suddenly had emotions and feelings where before there was a void.
How can one have such strong emotions for a person they never met?
I thought about tracking him down on a few occasions. Finding his phone number to call him and make him aware of the fact that I knew he was a scumbag who didn't want anything to do with his youngest child.
I could have. I wanted to. I didn't. It wouldn't have changed anything. It wouldn't have changed the fact that he didn't care.
He was a lousy father. I want to believe I'm better off without him, but the "what if" factor creeps into the back of my head and that makes it hard to believe.
I included his obituary to prove just how little I mattered.
SALISBURY -- Albert Shattuck, 58, died June 25, 2010, at Concord Hospital after a long illness.
He was born April 26, 1952, in Bradford to Winifred and Edward Shattuck.
He worked for RH White Construction in Merrimack for 20 years. He was an avid outdoorsman who enjoyed hunting and fishing. He loved his children and grandchildren. He was an accomplished woodworker.
IN HIS LIFE: Family members included his loving wife of 21 years, Cherry (Edmiston) Shattuck; two sons, Louis Wilks of Loudon and A.J. Shattuck of Newmarket; two daughters, Wendy Pavnick of Salisbury, and Belinda Pelletier of Franklin; four granddaughters, Elizabeth, Emily, Jaylyn and Christina; four brothers, Allen, Edward, Timothy Shattuck and Richard Ingalls; and four sisters, Peggy Ames, Nina Gillcash, Nancy Blidberg and Judy Mason. He is predeceased by a brother, Jack Shattuck.
SERVICES: A memorial gathering is Wednesday from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. at the Cremation Society of New Hampshire, 172 King St., Boscawen. Relatives and friends invited to attend.
Is it better to lose something you never had?