I dont usually do these long post but this has been very much on my heart and mind lately. I’ve been thinking over the last few days about how we as people become who we are, is it nature, nurture, group think? My parents taught me a lot about pride, perseverance, courage and integrity and I took those things out into the world and after many frogs, I finally kissed a prince. Now this story is not a love story as it is a testimony to how I was able to grow and be who I am in this community. Many years ago, I met THE MAN. He was smart and funny and had a way of talking to me that went through me like warm milk he was a fairly dominant man but that came more out of confidence than anything else and I liked and responded to it. After some flirting we began dating. But that’s not exactly what I want to write about. What I want to talk about is how he and I helped me to grow as a person. Even though I rarely ever called him “Daddy” in all the ways that count he was just that and unapologetically so. We fell into a routine, he would decide and I would do. There were no contracts, no rules of engagement but there was trust. Throughout this time he never referred to me as his boy even though I was very much his boy. I came to understand that to his view, his “job” if it can be described that way was to understand that even though I was his “boy” that I was still very much a man. Now was our relationship like any other Daddy/boy relationship? No and to a lot of on-lookers I was the worst possible boy. I had too much freedom and was too opinionated. I was treated by my “Daddy” differently than others expected. I was never yelled at in public (and by the way, I was a handful and he would have been perfectly right to have done so), but he did always correct me in the way that best suited our dynamic and that was to simply say “baby you were not right”. He would always share with me that his goal was to ensure that I became a better person each and every day that we were together. I remember being outraged at that thought. But I understand it much better today. Over the years that we were together, he took the things my parents taught me and gave them purpose. He taught me that having integrity is the hardest thing to maintain but it underpins who I am and so it is worth having and maintaining. That I was better than my self-talk and how to be gracious and kind even while telling the truth and that the truth is important. The thing is that he did this without donning copious amounts of leather. He never picked up a whip or a paddle, never taught a seminar but his heart was Daddy through and through. He was always Michael not Sir Michael, Daddy Michael or any of the titles some seem to revere as a confirmation of their stature in the community and among their peers. I was never required to genuflect and walk 3 feet behind him in public, I was asked to do thing rather than order to do. He was just Michael but in my heart I knew that he was more. Now there are those who will read this and think that he was a weak example of a Daddy (Where was the training the brow-beating into submission, the instilling that every boy should be the same and treated as something less than an individual?). To the contrary he was one of the strongest men I have met to this day because he walked his own path and took this lost boy with him, gave him strength to get tested for HIV and then to deal with the diagnosis and walked him through becoming a fully confident well-adjusted person who finally knows his worth, taught him to stand on his own as a boy who is now very much a man. I have always believed that when someone leaves you, they leave you those parts of themselves that you need to move forward in your own life. When Michael passed away on that Winter morning many years ago I know that is exactly what happened. I am now blessed to be able to give that to another person and that makes me the happiest I have been in my life. Is it perfect? No but it is ours without the definitions and approval of others being needed. I have no desire than to be any different than I am today. I take care of my boy, my family and my home. I give when I can and I am a bastard when I am crossed. The most important thing is that I am Daddy to him regardless of how people may want to define that for themselves and he is my boy and like someone did for me, I am here to make sure that he learns the important things like respect, courage, perseverance and to show him that he is valued and has value as a person. If he never walks 3 feet behind me or kneels at my feet again, it will be fine as long as he has learned the rest.
Posted on: Mon, 22 Sep 2014 14:58:44 +0000
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