On Silences and Father's Day

Books by E. Ethelbert Miller

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On Silences and Father's Day

June 20, 2009

Tomorrow is Father’s Day. I’m hundreds of miles away from my son and daughter. They are 22 and 27 and living in two different cities. I’m not a missing dad. I’ve never been missing. Neither was my father. I come from the tradition of quiet and silent men. The tradition of fathers who never left their wives and children, but instead “disappeared” into basements, backrooms, back porches and bedroom corners. The tradition of men who could always be found asleep in front of a television set or sitting in the dark mumbling at walls.

I come from the tradition of fathers who were watchers and providers; men who were ignored or unable to help during emergencies. My fatherhood has been defined by such things as the inability to drive, master the tools in a toolbox, or place a star at the top of a Christmas tree. How many times during a family crisis did my wife just pick-up the phone and call her brother in Iowa or a friend living down the street?

Within his own home, my father was never viewed as “the smart one.” This title was bestowed on my brother Richard, his first born and later my sister as a result of her becoming a nurse. Every family should have someone in the medical profession. It’s like having a second key or a smoke detector that works.

I grew up watching my father pushed into the corners of rooms at family gatherings in Brooklyn. No one ever looked to him for an opinion. I never heard him having any major political agreement or disagreement with someone. My father was invisible until someone died. That was when he became a man of comfort for relatives that he always considered distant.

When I think about my father, I am reminded about the loneliness that comes with fatherhood. I am reminded of the intimacy that never raised its hand. Stoic is a word I can’t use to describe him. Sadness seems like the proper sweater he could have worn.

My father, Egberto Miller coming home late from work, night after night. My mother always up and ready to fix him something to eat. Yet how often did she join him at the table? Where was the intimacy? Was it the darkness outside the kitchen window? Did my parents just simply speak a common language?

The shadow of my father continues to fall over my fatherhood, as the period of my life moves toward fall. My children are grown. They are perhaps a few years from becoming parents. I picked up the newspaper today and read where President Obama wants to begin a national conversation on fatherhood. A conversation, maybe that’s what was missing during all my days of fatherhood. A conversation, not a lecture or an explanation. A conversation where one talks and listens, and where one is listened to. How many of us live quiet lives of desperation? We live without partners, within and outside marriage.

We talk about fathers and fatherhood but we often lip sync. We say those things we want others to hear. My father never really said much to me. My conversation was always with my mother, as I find my own children are with theirs.

What we never seem to talk about is how the men who stayed with their families suffered from the absence of intimacy in their lives. We never talk about the quiet death of their hearts. We fail to record these stories because we prefer myths and fairytales. We want to believe in happy endings, especially on Father’s day. I remember my father this June because he was a good man. Was he happy? No. I overheard my father’s praying one day to God. I was little at the time. I was surprised to see my father on his knees in the bedroom. I was even more surprised when God didn’t answer.

E. Ethelbert Miller June 20, 2009

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posted 20 June 2009