Why I hate Father's Day

It's that time of year again when we all celebrate a manufactured holiday to increase the revenues of mass market producers of goods that none of us really needs but buy anyway.

Father's Day. 

Initially created as a second to Mother's Day it never really caught on until the creator, one Sonora Dodd, decided to team up with various retailers of merchandise aimed at men.  These schmoes popularized the holiday and made it an essential part of the Mass Market Holiday Cycle (including Valentines Day, Mother's Day, Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas etc...).

I would probably like Father's Day more if it didn't perpetually remind me of my father.  Kind of hard to get around that.  Facebook is laden with soupy nostalgic vomit aimed toward "dads who were always there" and "to pop who never let us down."  Well, I can't relate.  My own father was a derelict absent manipulative arrogant whore.  He raised me to believe that people were tools and no more.  People are implements to be used for my own purposes, so I was taught.  Sure, like cattle to be slaughtered, you should treat them as humanly as possible but remember, they're just meat.

The miles I have to go to recover my lost humanity are only beginning.  Well, that's not true, I have been trying to make headway for years but for every few steps I take forward, I eventually turn around and march right back.  At times, I feel that I go further back with each retro-walk to my pig pen.  I'm pretty sure I do, actually.

Here's a Father's Day story of "Pop" to warm all the bleeding hearts out there:

Dad and I were sitting in his pickup truck eating some Burger King during a fine spring morning when I was 13.  We were parked along side of his "shop" where he maintained all of his trucks and equipment for his business.  I will relay the conversation to the best of my memory.

Dad: "What makes something wrong or right?"
Me: "Um... I dunno..." This was my general response to questions like this from my father as I knew that I would never be able to guess his answer.
Dad: "It's really a matter of perspective and circumstances.  Here, I will show you what I mean."
At this point he reaches behind the seat and pulls the Ruger 10-22 from its resting place.  "Roll down your window, dummy."  I reach over and roll it down.  "Do you see those rabbits out there in the field?
Me: "Yeah."
Dad: "Think you can hit one from here?"
Me: "I'm pretty sure I can."
Dad: "Let's see you do it." At this point I take the rifle and draw down on a hapless bunny munching clover in a field.  I free the safety, settle the cross hairs, squeeze the trigger gently.  I feel the minor recoil of the rifle and the rabbit is left flopping and twitching in the green grass.  I reengage the safety and hand the rifle back to my dad glowing with pride that I was able to take the rabbit at a considerable distance.  I was also filled the rush of my sympathetic response system sending adrenaline and endorphins throughout my body.  I felt good.  I felt strong.  I felt powerful.
Dad: "Not bad.  So, how do you feel?"
Me: "Thanks.  I feel good.  That was fun."
Dad (smiling): "Is it rabbit hunting season?  Do you have a license?"
Me: (suddenly feeling weird and tricked): "No..."
Dad: (still grinning like Satan): "Did you get caught?"
Me: "No..."
Dad: "Then you did nothing wrong.  That is the difference between right and wrong.  If you are going to do something, you either ensure you can't get in trouble for it or that you won't get caught."

I nodded understanding.  I nodded as my psychology was shifted diametrically.

This conversation was my father's version of the Birds and the Bees.  We went through this ritual and he threw a box of condoms to me and said "Good luck and have fun".

This is only one scenario of many I could relate.  His version of reality was so skewed from what benefits society that he likely could be considered by the "professionals" as a sociopath.

The terrible part is, though, is that he wasn't abusive in the sense that he drank a lot and then threw me around the house.  He didn't have rages and make me feel small.  He tried to empower me.  He taught me the necessity of be self-reliant and to put trust in only a few highly vetted people.  He taught me so many things that have helped me immensely in life.  Yet, all the education was/is wrapped in the casing of entitlement and arrogance.  It's like eating really nutritious food that's been laced with a mind altering drug.

I hate Father's Day because I hate what my father was.  I hate what I have been.  I hate what I might become.  I hate thinking that there are four little people I might ruin.  All that hate is wrapped up in the single holiday of Father's Day.

He is in prison now.  His world wise ways finally failed him and he got caught.  So, apparently, what he was doing was wrong if his bunny lesson is to be believed.