The Father, Son and the Holy Ghost [LEWC]

The three men I admire most...they took the last train for the coast…”

~Don Maclean; American Pie~

What was that moment in life that irrevocably changed my life? I don’t know. How do you tell a story like that? I guess if I’m going to tell a story like that, I sort of have to start from the beginning, right? I was born and raised Catholic. Irish-Catholic, or Irish-American-Catholic. My Uncle was a priest and when I was a kid my whole family thought I would grow up to be a priest too. I knew better then…I know better now. My Uncle was also a Chaplain in the Army, so his “parishioners”, I suppose, were soldiers, and he sort of like this mercenary with a cross, but the priests and Monsignor of the church my family attended, Immaculate Heart of Mary, called my Uncle Father Joe. Father Joe Anderson, I guess was his name, but my brothers and sisters, and me, called him Uncle Father Basil. Basil was his middle name. That honorific would come to have a bittersweet irony as I grew up.

Growing up in the Zodeaux family was like some bizarre mash-up of The Brady Bunch and the Adams Family, or maybe not so ooky and kooky as that, and if I’m being honest more like some lame After School Special that told the tragic tale of two drunk parents who, in spite of their alcoholism, loved their children very much…or at least Mom did. The only time my father ever told me that he loved me was when I was around 10 years old.

He had been on a bender for about a week and missing for at least four days. No one knew if he was dead or alive, my mother panicked as she often tended towards, and I, the oldest of eight children, unsure what would become of us. When he finally appeared he was still drunk. While I had become used to seeing my mother drunk, and often drunk, I never had really seen my father drunk. The two of them, my Mother and Father, were different kinds of drunks. My Father was the “I drink alone” sort of drunk who would hole up somewhere and drink himself into oblivion, while my Mother was a “social drunk”.

On this particular day, the day my Father reappeared from his bender still drunk, he was in the living room holding little Rose on his lap, Mellissa and Erin sitting beside him, my Mother came to my bedroom to inform Jake, Billy and I that my Father was home. Billy and Jake stayed in the bedroom. I went into the living room. My father never really smiled much, and I had never really thought about it much but I guess I got the impression my Father really didn’t like me very much. Even so, when I walked into the living room that day, my Father holding Rose looked up and smiled big. He smiled as if he was truly glad to see me.

He motioned for me to come over to the couch. I did. He picked Rose up off of his lap and put her down on the floor, and she, being only two or so, oblivious to the reality of the strained politics of family, crawled away and my Father asked Mellissa and Erin, they only being three and four or so, to let he and I have some privacy, so they got up off the couch and left the living room. My Father patted the couch cushion beside him to indicate he wanted me to sit beside him, and I being the obedient son did. He asked me how I was. I said I was fine. He mumbled some stuff of which I wasn’t really sure what he was saying, but I could smell the whiskey on his breath and knew he was drunk.

Suddenly, and to my great consternation and discomfort, my Father started crying. I squirmed on the couch wishing to be anywhere else but there, but then my Father told me he loved me. “What?” I said surprised. He told me that he realized he never had told me this, but that he had always loved me, and as he told me this he cried like a little baby, much like Rose would only Rose hadn’t the vocabulary my Father did. I didn’t really know what to say or do, so I said what I supposed any obedient ten year old son might say in that circumstance and I told I him I loved him too.

Even then, when I was only ten years old, I was painfully aware of the manipulation of that phrase “I love you”, particularly when my Mother said it which was all the time. No really, I mean all the time. Like a gazillion bazillion bobabazillion times a day. Every time she said it; “I love you”, it was uncomfortably clear she expected to hear the phrase back, so as it was, I wound up spending my childhood telling my Mother “I love you” back a gazillion bazillion bobabazillion times a day. I came to hate that stupid phrase, but this particular day, that day my drunken blubbering Father told me he loved me, I didn’t hate it so much and I didn’t mind so much saying it back.

Years later, when I had all grown up and finally escaped the madness of my family, and doing my level best to live independent of them while still being a part of them, living in Los Angeles struggling to pay the bills, I remembered that moment just before I called my Father to ask him to loan me $50 dollars so I could pay the deposit required to have the electricity turned back on. I actually had a job that paid pretty well, and I was living in the Hollywood Hills in an apartment that the owner loved to always remind me was the same apartment complex where John Wayne once lived, and later John Lennon, and years after that Quinten Tarantino lived, and the owner of the complex always reminded me of how in the exact apartment I shared with my asshole roommate Lance was once occupied by a couple that always called each other “Honey Bunny and Pumpkin”.

The owner of the apartment complex insisted that this was where Tarantino got the idea for his two diner robbing outlaws in Pulp Fiction. It’s not that I didn’t believe him. I believed it, why wouldn’t I? It’s just that every time he told me this stupid story it sort of felt manipulative in that sort of “I love you” way my Mother always used, but with my landlord I was never clear what I was supposed to say back. My asshole roommate Lance, an actor – actors have got to be some of the biggest assholes God ever made – used to always give me grief about my reticence to respond to that the tired story of “Honey Bunny and Pumpkin”, using my reticence as an excuse to lecture me on the importance of social etiquette. Of course, you would think that social etiquette demanded that if you had a responsibility to pay the goddamned electricity bill you would pay it, but Lance was forever not paying the electricity bill on the months it was his turn to do so.

“You have to remember J., I have ADD.” This was always his excuse for everything. It was, of course, his excuse for why he “forgot” to pay the electricity bill and why we were now without power, and why we had to come up with a $90 dollar deposit. Lance had $40 of it but didn’t have the rest and even though he acknowledged that it was not my fault or responsibility to kick in any money for the deposit, he plead, he charmed, he argued, that I had to loan him the $50 extra dollars needed to pay the deposit to get the electricity back on. It didn’t matter that I had all ready paid the stupid bill that was his responsibility that month. Lance needed more of my help. It didn’t matter that I didn’t have the $50 dollars, Lance plead, charmed and argued that surely I could find someone to loan me the $50 so I could loan him the stupid $50, so I called my Father.

I didn’t want to call my Father. He and I barely spoke to each other and had barely spoke to each other ever since…well, the politics of family are complicated I suppose, and maybe everyone has some sort of horrific family story to tell, but somehow I don’t think many have my story to tell about a drunk Mother too neurotic and too out of her blathering mind to do anything other than be an emotional basket case, of a drunk Father always reticent and sullen too tragically disappointed in a wasted life to really ever be a Father, and of an Uncle Father Basil, also a drunk (what Catholic priest is ever sober?) who had to step in to care for his Sister and her eight children because a drunk Father too tragically disappointed with life refused to do so.

Shortly after that incident, when I was ten years old, in the living room with my Father, my parents finally got divorced. It was the only time my father had ever told me he loved me, and it appeared as if that might have been one of the last times I would ever see him. After the divorce my father disappeared. Not just for a week, but for months and finally years. No one knew where my father was, or even if he was alive. My Mother wasn’t working and no income was coming in at all. She wasn’t really in any condition to work, being a drunk, and emotional basket case, and of course, the mother of eight children. My Uncle was helping my Mother out, but just how much could a Chaplain in the Army really do?

As it turned out there was much more a Chaplain in the Army could do that I, after two years of a missing Father and at twelve years old could ever imagine. My Uncle had devised a scheme where he would adopt us children, have my Mother become the legal guardian and this would put my Uncle in a position where he had dependents and would get a raise to accommodate those dependents – us – and also take advantage of the housing program the Army offered where he could purchase a house for our family. The only thing was, in order to pull this scheme off both my Mother and Father would have to sign us children away for adoption.

My Uncle hired a private investigator to find my Father, but I, with all the infinite wisdom of a twelve year old kept insisting that Uncle Father Basil was just wasting his money because once that private eye finally found my Father and he found out what my Uncle and Mother were scheming he would do what any honorable man would do and step up and finally start taking care of my Mother and his children.

I thought a lot about this time when I debated on whether it was worth it or not to call my Father and ask him for the $50 loan to pay the deposit on the electricity bill. Why should I call this guy, my Father? At this time in my life many years had gone by. John Lennon had been killed by some nut bag trying to impress Jodi Foster who would go on to win Oscars. Later George Harrison would die of cancer. The Stones would still keep going, but the Ramones were pretty much over at this point, the Clash had a crisis of conscience and fell apart, and an independent band from Minneapolis, the Replacements, had faded away into obscurity. Even so, Paul Westerberg had written some great songs, and while debating on whether to call my old man and ask him for this measly little help I kept thinking of a lyric Westerberg wrote in a song called Androgynous. The song was about a cross dressing father and really had nothing at all to do with my own family circumstance but a particular lyric in that song stung me like a violent wasp the first time I ever heard it, and that lyric has forever stayed dancing around the back of my head.

The lyric repeated itself over and over in my head while I looked elsewhere to find the cash to get the electricity turned back on. “Well, you may be a Father but you sure ain’t a Dad”. Over and over again this simple little lyric set against a simple little melody swam around my consciousness while I tried to figure out what I should do. I didn’t even have my Father’s phone number. I didn’t want to call my Mother and ask her for it because I knew she would just prod and poke until I finally told her why I wanted it. I was never really very good at lying and I knew I would tell her why and then she would get all blubbery and filled with shame because she couldn’t help me with the $50 dollars and I would have to assuage her self imposed guilt until she would finally sniffle and say: “I love you.”

When the private investigator finally found my Father my Mother decided it was a good idea to have myself, Jake, Katie and Billy all get dressed up and go to the lawyers office, Mr. Darden, to witness my Mother and Father sign us away for adoption. Jake, Billy and I all had these Sunday suits we would wear to church. Plaid jackets, mine red, Jon’s blue and Billy’s green, and shorts that matched, I guess because we were kids and kids didn’t wear long pants with matching jackets. It’s funny, but I don’t really remember what Katie wore. Something cute, something sweet, something formal, but I can’t picture that, just the stupid plaid suits me and my brother wore, and I’ll never forget the pain in the ass fussing my Mother showered us with as she put on our clip on ties.

I was still convinced that my Father wasn’t really going to go along with this. How could he? He was a man wasn’t he? He was a Father with responsibilities goddamnit! At Mr. Darden’s office, my Father was all ready there, sitting in one of those leather bound chairs that I guess lawyers liked to place in front of their desks for their clients to sit on. It was matching leather bound chairs and Mr. Darden pulled the other one out so my Mother could sit on it, then he invited my siblings and I to sit on the couch, and still I remained convinced that this would be the moment that my Father would come to his senses and declare that he loved his children – sober this time – and refuse to sign us away for adoption.

Finally I decided to call Melly and get my Father’s phone number from her. Melly was always my Father’s favorite child. Melly was kind of everyone’s favorite, child or sister. I suppose, for my Father, and even for my Mother, Melly represents a happier time. She was born in Dallas during a time when neither of my parents seemed to be alcoholics, or if they were they didn’t know it yet, and my Father had a great job, my Mother was happily social with all the social women of Dallas, and life was good. Prior to living in Dallas, Jon, Katie, Billy and I lived in Panama with my Mother who had carted us off to this jungle land to live with her brother, our uncle, Uncle Father Basil. Sometime during our stay in the jungle, my Father got a job in Dallas and wooed my Mother back and we moved back to the States, and shortly after that Melly was born.

Melly gave me my Father’s phone number with no questions asked and I called him and asked him if he could loan me the $50 dollars. He had all these questions, clearly annoyed that I wanted money from him. Probably annoyed that it had been years since I called him and when I finally did it was to ask him for money. He asked me why I needed it and why I didn’t pay the electric bill on time. I explained to him that it was my “ADD” addled roommate who “forgot”, as he put it, to pay the bill and explained to my Father that this guy Lance was a real jerk and always “forgetting” to pay this or that. Finally my Father said real derogatorily; “Well Jean, you’re a bright young man. Couldn’t you have easily predicted that your roommate would do this and plan for such a thing?”

I was outraged. Partly because I had predicted it but didn’t plan for the easily predicted turn-off because of a moronic actor riddled with “ADD”, but also because in the world of prediction there were plenty of events in my life that were easily predicted, but when it came to making predictions about people I cared for, I always had this stupid tendency to hold great faith in them and always give them the benefit of the doubt long after they had removed all doubt. So, doing my level best to keep my rage in check, I replied; “Sure Dad, I could’ve predicted this would happen but I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt.” My father snapped back; “It doesn’t sound like this guy deserved the benefit of the doubt JP.” I snapped back too and without even thinking I said; “Yeah, well that’s where I’m stupid Dad. It’s not like you deserved the benefit of the doubt all those years ago when you signed us away for adoption, but until the ink was dry on the papers I kept holding the faith that you would just step up and be a Dad!”

It got real quiet between us on the phone after that remark. Then, finally, my Father said; “I’ll send you a hundred. You don’t have to pay me back”. He asked for my address and I gave it to him and then we hung up. I don’t know why I always let my Mom off the hook on that adoption thing and not my Father, but I did. Mostly because it’s not like my Mother abandoned me…well, not really. I mean she was all too often drunk out of her mind and she was a violent drunk who caused much abuse, and the truth be known she caused so much abuse I left the family just to get away from all that abuse, and since we’re being honest here, I guess I always sort of knew that my Father never really left us as much as she pushed him away, but even so, that doesn’t excuse just grabbing a pen and signing away your children like you just hit the lottery.

Sometime before that phone call, a time when I still lived in New Mexico, which was where my family finally settled (Las Cruces, New Mexico) just long enough for my parents to get a divorce, I bartended in a ski resort town Ruidoso, where my Father also happened to live at the time. At that time, I had made an effort to patch things up with my Father and I would visit him at his little log cabin in the woods next to a stream and we would sit at the stream and fish, never really saying much to each other, but somehow I got the impression that my Father thought that this was real father and son stuff, so I would try to make time to do this with him from time to time.

He had sobered up by this time, so he wouldn’t really visit me at the bar I worked, but sometimes he would, usually after a long period of me being scarce, drop by to say hello. One day he came in during the afternoon, which was always slow, to invite me for a fishing date the next day. While he sat at the bar sipping his coffee I stocked the bar getting ready for the crowd sure to start rolling in within the next few hours. The only other people in the bar was a very pretty lady from Texas (Texans would often vacation in Ruidoso because there ain’t no mountains in Texas) and two younger guys that looked like they spent too much time at the gym.

One of the guys started hitting up on the lady from Texas. At first I paid no attention to this because there’s nothing unusual about guys hitting on babes in a bar and I kept stocking the bar while chatting with my Father. Chatting with my Father, of course, meant not saying much at all and usually he or I asking the other a pointless question while either he or I would grunt or nod some wordless answer. At some point, between stocking the bar, grunting and nodding, and asking pointless questions, I noticed that the pretty lady from Texas was looking over to me pleadingly while now both of the muscle head guys were what was obviously bothering her.

I walked over to them and looked at the lady and asked if these two guys were bothering her. She nodded gratefully, but one of the muscle heads told me to mind my own business. I replied that this was what I was doing and that the both of them should leave the lady alone and go sit at one of the tables and be cool. They were all standing next to the cocktail waitress stand which was defined by two brass coils. On the other side of the bar where I stood was the well and behind me were the shelves where I kept the bottled liquor. One of the muscle heads laughed and asked me what I would do if they didn’t go sit somewhere else. I told him that I would throw them out of the bar.

The other muscle head laughed a stupid throaty laugh and put both hands around one of the brass coils that defined the waitress station and bent it out so that it was straighter than the curl it normally was, and said; “Oh yeah? You and what army?” seriously, this is exactly what this clown said. Can you believe that? It was sort of amusing to me in that this was an obvious tactic to show how strong he was, but brass is malleable and easy to bend so it was sort of pointless. Crystal, my skinny 90 pound cocktail waitress could have just as easily bent that brass ring. Even so, clearly these two clowns were looking for a fight and I had no back-up.

Without over thinking this, I reached behind me without even looking – the bar was perfectly set up in a way where I could rely upon “muscle memory” to grab the bottle I needed without ever looking behind me – and grabbed the Galliano bottle and swung it so it hit the head of the guy who bent the brass ring. He dropped like a ton of bricks out cold. (Galliano bottles, for those who don’t know, while glass, could just as easily be used as a bat in a soft ball game) I told the other muscle head, shocked and dismayed at what had just happened to put the brass ring back as it was. He just stood there like a deer in front of headlights. I stepped up on my well and jumped atop the bar and pointed the Galliano bottle at him. “Put the brass ring back the way it was.” He did so. “Now, pick up your boyfriend and leave before I get really mad.” He struggled to pick up his friend who was now regaining consciousness and leaned against his friend as they stumbled out of the bar.

The next day I met my father at his little log cabin to fish. We walked down to the stream with our fishing poles, not a word spoken between us. We sat at the edge of the stream and waited for fish to bite that never would…never did, still not uttering a single word, or grunt. Finally, after about an hour of biteless silence, my Father finally spoke up. “That was really something.” I had no idea what he was talking about and waited for him to finish his thought, but that wasn’t my Father’s way, so after a moment I said; “What?” “That thing you did at the bar yesterday.” “Oh”, I said quietly. “That.” It was quiet for about another quarter of an hour and then my Father said; “You must have got that from your Mother.” “What” I asked. “That fight…that courage.” He answered.

I didn’t really know what to say to that. It’s not that I didn’t quite understand what he was saying. I understood somewhat, but not really. My Mother, no doubt, was a scrapper and had quite the mouth on her, but still…I don’t know, it just didn’t set right with me, what he said. We were quiet for a few more minutes and then he started telling me about a time when he was the around the same age as I at this moment and how he was in a similar set of circumstances. He wasn’t the bartender and was just another customer, but as my Dad explained it, the bartender didn’t seem to care that this big brutish guy was imposing unwanted advances on a pretty lady, so my Dad stepped up and told the guy to leave her alone.

What my father told me next still burns me with rage, embarrassment, and yet this sort of understanding of whom he was and maybe why things had turned out the way they did. What he said was that the brute had, with all his might, pushed my Father back into the chair he was sitting in and asked my Dad what he was going to do about it? My Father looked me straight in the eyes and said; “JP, it was at that exact moment that I came to understand my place in life, and what I realized was that I was no hero.” We never said another word that day.

What could I possibly to say to such a confession? I wanted to jump up and grab the folding chair I was standing on and raise it above my head threateningly and scream; “You could have taken the chair he pushed you on and found some leverage, for Christ Sakes! With the right kind of fulcrum and leverage you can move mountains!” Instead, I said nothing. What was there to say, really? He had made his choices just as I had made mine. I guess, in the end, the best I could do, on those days when I was able to muster up my best, was show him compassion, and on the other days…well, I guess on those other days I showed him less than compassion.

Such is life, and I guess everyone has nasty skeletons in their closet and every family has their dirty little secrets. This is mine. I was sired by a father who lacked the courage of conviction to be a father and by a mother, who had plenty of courage, but it was the kind of courage one finds in a bottle of King George the IV scotch whiskey, and what kind of courage is that, really? I had an Uncle who was a priest of whom we called Uncle Father Basil who one day adopted us all and became my legal father because my biological Father was no hero.

What was the life changing experience that changed my life? It was, of course, that day in Mr. Darden’s office where me with my plaid jacket and matching shorts and a clip on tie watched my Father and Mother sign us kids away for adoption so my Father didn’t have to fret over the financial burden we were, and my Mother didn’t have to sober up long enough to figure that mess out on her own, and my Uncle could keep playing mercenary with a cross stationed in all sorts of exotic places while the Army sent checks to my Mother, our “legal guardian”, in a home my Uncle bought us through some military program. That moment in time would creep into my world plenty, and it crept into my world that day on the edge of a stream in Ruidoso, and it crept into my world that day I called my Father asking for a $50 loan only to give him a piece of my mind in exchange.

Everyone has that life changing moment that defines the person they ultimately become, and for me that day in Mr. Darden’s office has certainly defined me, and ultimately in ways I can’t even begin to understand, and I suppose that fateful day defines me still. I’m no priest, and while all of us in the Zodeaux family agree my Uncle was a saint, I don’t much care for priests, but I suppose, if I’m being honest, I can get pretty damned sanctimonious in my own preachy way, but I was that way long before that day in Mr. Darden’s office. I guess the difference between my sanctimony before that day and now is that I didn’t have to struggle so hard to find compassion for others. I still hold faith in people, but that day made me more of a realist than I care to be, so in the end, the best I can do is remain cautiously optimistic.

Yep. I S&F the competition! Awesome job writing this! Very worth the read!

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux


So deep,and powerful, I read it twice.


Now you may take my words as opinion,or you might take offense, but I truly believe you are a stronger man, a wiser man, from your upbringing. Not all parents are really parents. " The box you came in ",or the "sperm donor", are two fine examples, of responses I have heard. Now maybe the offensive part. I believe your love for your family is strong, regardless of what your parents didn't do,or did. I say this because I know people, who have had those kind of parents, the ones that you disowned. The wanting of love,far between the earning of respect. Where the thought of ones parents, bring out the flood of emotions, that only drink, could fog away. I have seen these type of people,and their responses are very, very far from yours, my friend. I am sure you have seen them too, being a bartender. Funny thing being a bartender. I was one for a short time. I always had great advice, but when it came to needing advice, there was never a soul in the bar, to give it.


In conclusion Jean, THANK YOU for sharing this. It takes courage, and it takes guts to spill your thoughts on paper, or the ATS internet grey box, and I am pleased that their are still those, willing to share their lives, without the veil of secrecy, to hide behind.

Thank You.

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux


Well done, as always. It's people like you who despite the past, shine the brightest. They say that we turn out like our parents do, but you are proof positive of the fallacy of that statement.

SnF.

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux

two clowns were looking for a fight and I had no back-up.

If I were there you would've had major back up. At that time I was running a crew thru several bars working the door and bouncing ass. Funnest part of my life. This stuff is like an emotional roller coaster Jean.

I stepped up on my well and jumped atop the bar and pointed the Galliano bottle at him. “Put the brass ring back the way it was.” He did so. “Now, pick up your boyfriend and leave before I get really mad.” He struggled to pick up his friend who was now regaining consciousness and leaned against his friend as they stumbled out of the bar.

Perfect. LMAO You did right having no back up.

Randy

SnF

reply to post by Druid42

Well done, as always. It's people like you who despite the past, shine the brightest. They say that we turn out like our parents do, but you are proof positive of the fallacy of that statement.

Yep and my Dad was the same way. His Father was a bad alchy, burned the house down one night after losing in a poker game. My Dad never touched a drop.

That was great Jean. Glad to know you a lot better. YOU are part of the magic.

That was a pretty decent story there. Definitely worth the flag and star donation.

Parents only create the ground you fall on. Crappy parents produce fertile ground. Well, that's what I tell myself anyway. (You do that too, okay?)

This is the first story I've read - or at least can recall reading here - on ats. I'm glad you were my first. ;>

I would have sent you that $50 in a heart beat. I was signed away by my father/sperm donor too. I think I finally found some real closure through your writings. Thank You JP. Bet you didn't know the healing power in your pen.

Bright Blessings JP....Star and Flag.

Des

School of hardknocks bro, alot of us graduated from there, some of us are still there. Alcohol ruins people, it steals what they could be and gives them apathy in return. That stuff doesn't make people it breaks them.

Not MY story; but definitely close. We suffered through crappy childhoods, aware of the badness, knowing deep down that we could, and we would do better as parents. I've found that my childhood: the good, the bad, and even the ugly, shaped me. It made me the person I am today. Not perfect. Better than I would've been otherwise I hope. S&F for a compelling read!

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux


S&F

I am so glad you were able to rise above your childhood to become the great and strong and wonderful person you are today. Great story.

Wonderfully written, my friend!

S & F

I'm giving this thread a well deserved bump. I enjoy reading others work. Gives me ideas and inspiration.

Great work and good luck. I think I'll toss my name in the next competition.

I did read it twice and it was even more amazing the second time. Truly brilliance. I have saved this to my hard drive and will most likely back up to disk, even if ATS goes down one day, I can have this one amazing piece from JPZ on my zip drive. Required reading imho.

Great story JPZ. Is this based on your own life or is it all fiction?. Either way, very entertaining read. S&F