DEPARTMENT:

A letter to my father,
42 years late

By Michael C. Fischer

I think of you now and then, sometimes often, and I wish I could sit down somewhere quiet and private to talk with you. Nothing special is on my mind. I just want to say what is going on with me, how I feel about things, and be with you as an equal.

Michael Fischer shares time with his dad, Abraham, in the last photo taken of them together.

Of course, you are still my father, so I would want to hear you speak your mind and your heart. Mostly, I would want you to hear me, and relate to me as you can, in whatever way you choose.

So in my imaginational picture, we are enjoying that coming together peacefully and with the advantage of us being much older now. I would want us to be at ease and able to talk about many different things. I do not seek advice, but something else.

What I want from you is recognition and acceptance of me as an individual who is different from you in many ways. Though we are so similar as men, as people, as son and father, I would want you to see and hear me with an open mind. I would want you to be interested in me as I am, and in what I care so much about.

When we talk I would look for honesty and trust in what we say and what we mean. Driven by the power of love we feel for each other, close and meaningful communication could be a fulfillment of a deep yearning both of us have felt. I think there was an emptiness both of us felt while you were alive. We somehow couldn’t reach each other, and we felt frustration and distance between us.

I was 36 years old when you died. For 20 years prior to that we both felt unable to talk with each other and understand what each of us was really saying. Survival subjects like work, sex, marriage, friendships, and getting older were impossible to discuss openly, factually. Both of us just didn’t know enough to find the words and courage. The need was there, but we couldn’t talk. Love did not teach us that.

Maybe now, after so many years, we can relate to each other better. Maybe we can do the improbable and reach out from the wellsprings of an unnamable love, and be able to know and express our true humanity as me and as family.

This is a more recent photo of Michael, who will be 79 in October.

Although it is too late to affect the past, it is not too late to matter. Now is a good time to experience and really know the satisfaction that comes with a love that is deeply felt and life-giving. We both missed some of that while you were alive. But now I am more aware and appreciative of you in thought and feeling.

Maybe on some actual plane of consciousness that I do not know about we can touch and meet, and talk about living and being in ways we never could before. If we can really “hear” and understand each other we may be able to know more fully, with certainty, that love we felt for each other long ago, but kept silent and hidden.

And, maybe in finally “seeing” each other’s face we know what was there all along.

Michael Fischer was born and grew up in New York City. His dad, Abraham Fischer, was an insurance agent. Michael lives in Honolulu, moving to Hawaii in 1971. He has worked as a furniture designer, in engineering and construction, as a woodworker, sculptor and art teacher and as a massage therapist. Now semi-retired, he is engaged to Deanna Mukai.

Humorous, touching, inspiring, thought-provoking—we welcome your personal observations about Life After 50. E-mail your 600-word essay and phone number to Editor Dianne Glei at dianne@tradepublishing.com.

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