July 29, 2005
Slingshot
Father to Son
my pops mailed me the story of his life a few days ago. It's a rare occassion when a son has a view into the sorted details of how his father fell down; how he lost his wife, kids, and bright career to alcoholism. like all tragic stories, his started brightly and faded quickly, sadly. after one too many let-downs, my mom left him, packed me and my two brothers on a train bound for Springfield, Mass. to start over on the east coast; although he tried to find his own way back to us a few times, he failed, wasn't trying to be a cosby dad or didn't know how. found success in the corporate world over and over again, only to drink it away...tried to jetison outside of history itself, out, beyond the confines of what Black men were allowed to do during the 60s and 70s. he made up his own rules and shined brightly in the face of hope held hostage...broke sales records for Fortune 500 companies and set his sights on the ladder... he shined, then went out, out, as a lightbulb burnt too quickly by a short circuit...in the end, his simple, then as-yet, unrealized goal was to become nothing but a man. and nearly ten years later, he did it. they remarried, he rebuilt his career... Of course by then, he had done a lot of growing up too, wasn't the 20 year old kid he was when they first married...he came back to us, clean and sober and ready to reclaim his place in our lives. But it took almost another ten years for he and I to mend our own broken fences, some of them still need mending... However, I must say, my pops, Donald K. Taylor, has replaced lost time by finding himself, by being a father I can be proud of. he has become one of the most influential people in the making of who I am, the MAN I am, today. his unexpected, unabashedly self-honest 30-page autobiography is a profound gift to his son, one that I hope to be able to give to my son one day.
- cheo
Posted at July 29, 2005 09:34 PM