What Did You Learn From Your Dad?

When the Engine Light is Red

“Alcoholism is a well documented pathological reaction to unresolved grief.”

– David Cook

I don’t know what – if any – unresolved grief my dad may have struggled with…although I have my suspicions. What I do know is that he spent his entire life doing his darndest to keep his demons buried by the bottle.

A few years ago, right around Father’s Day, I heard a radio announcer, who was a new father himself, give a couple of examples of how his own father still helps him out. “When the engine light on my car is red,” he said, “I can call my dad, and he’ll come right over and check it out. Or if I have stuff to take to the dump, my dad will let me borrow his truck…”

The cheerful announcer then chirped on a little longer with more examples of how handy dandy his dad was. Then he asked listeners what our own dads meant to us. And I must admit that when it came to my dad, helping me out with everyday tasks was not what first came to mind.

Growing up, my dad didn’t teach me how to hang a picture or mow the lawn or drive a car. My mom and my brothers did all that. I was six when my dad moved out and my parents divorced shortly after. I usually only saw him once a week for dinner – that his new wife cooked for us.

Though my parents’ divorce was a bitter one, to put it mildly, my mom felt it was important that she keep us kids in the same city as our dad. Even though he had just moved all of us clear across the country right before they split up, instead of moving us kids back to her home province, where all her support system was, my mom made the decision to stay where she was as a single mom – just so we could be near our dad.

In hindsight, I’m glad she did – even though it certainly wasn’t the best choice for her.

One of the most important things my dad taught me was his love for words.

Literature was where his heart was. He loved reading and writing. He was constantly correcting my grammar and challenging me to increase my vocabulary. If I wanted to understand what the heck he was talking about, I needed a dictionary close by to look up the words he was using.

My mom took me to see plays; my dad encouraged me to take a playwriting course.

My dad was also passionate about poetry, philosophy, and physics – and tried to ignite interest in me for those subject matters. Poetry and philosophy never really resonated. But oddly enough, the physics did…eventually – when I finally found a real-life practical reason for needing to learn about it, years after repeatedly failing physics in school.

My Dad wasn’t just well-educated and highly knowledgeable, he also had a phenomenal memory and was extremely intelligent. He taught me how to think critically…how to question what I was told. In contrast to my mom, who was a Christian and taught me to have faith in a higher power, my dad was an atheist who taught me to doubt everything – and that when it came to organized religion, I ought to pay far more attention to people’s actions than what they say their beliefs are.

I had to find my own spiritual path, of course. Perhaps not surprisingly, the road I found myself traveling had elements of both belief systems: strong faith in a divine source and a healthy skepticism. These days, I am far more spiritual than religious and feel a powerful connection to what I would call a universal intelligence.

I suspect each person has a purpose for being here – and if we slow down long enough, on a regular basis, to hear the gentle guidance from our soul and pay attention to all the signs, coincidences and synchronicities the universe is continuously placing in our path, we will be able to find and fulfill that purpose by doing, and learning, what we need to…what we are here to learn and do.

I also think the gifts and challenges of our childhood – including our parents’ flaws and mistakes – hold invaluable lessons that can help us make better decisions as adults. Which brings me back to my dad’s boozing.

Though disastrous for him, my mom, and all of us kids, one of the greatest gifts my dad inadvertently gave me was to show me the tragic impacts of alcoholism. Through his life choices, he taught me that if you choose a substance to cope with life’s challenges, then that substance will become your life.

Or, put another way, when your engine light is red and you choose to ignore the warning signs and simply drive faster – by dealing with whatever crisis you’re going through by using whatever coping mechanisms suit your fancy – at some point, your engine will seize up. Your heart will cease to function properly…and therefore, so will you, your life, and the lives of the people closest to you.

My dad did me a tremendous service by demonstrating how not to deal with emotional pain and psychological trauma. In the aftermath of my husband, John’s, sudden death (when I was thirty-two), though certainly tempting, I knew better than to turn to the bottle (of booze or pills) to try and numb the horrific hurt associated with grieving a significant loss. I knew perfectly well where the road of unresolved grief led…and that’s not where I wanted to go.

Nor did my dad want to me to.

A few weeks after John died, my dad and I were out for a walk, and I made a comment about John’s death being a tragedy. My dad stopped, turned to me and said, “No, Maryanne. John’s death was an accident. How you choose to proceed with your life is what will determine whether his death was a tragedy or not.”

Ouch. You know something resonates as truth when it feels like someone has just smashed a two by four against your forehead. That’s what that felt like.

“Dad,” I said, “I do want to be happy again!”

To which he nodded and said, “Then be prepared to do the work to get yourself there.”

You can’t get much clearer, or wiser, than that.

“We do not achieve happiness by striving for it. Rather we achieve happiness by doing the work of our souls.”

— Robert Johnson

And so, I did what my dad never could for himself: I went down deep – into the grief – and felt the pain of everything I’d lost when John died…as well as the guilt of everything I’d gained. I did my very best to process the pain, learn from it, transform it into something positive, and take the time needed to allow my traumatized heart, mind and soul to slowly begin to heal…all so that I could truly be happy again someday – without needing to rely on a coping mechanism to keep the demons at bay.

In other words, having a father who was an alcoholic meant that I didn’t need to become one…when the perfect life opportunity arose for me to become one.

That may be a bit of a different way of looking at it, since quite often children of alcoholics become alcoholics themselves. But it doesn’t have to be this way. I think we can learn to look at our lives in a different way: a bigger-picture, more spiritual way. Because I strongly suspect that whatever happens to us is meant to happen to us, so that we can experience and learn what we need to for the journey ahead.

For just as having an alcoholic father showed me a path I did not want to take, having a father who loved literature more than life itself paved the way for a path I did want to take. If I didn’t have the dad I did, I highly doubt I would be a writer. Just as I have my mother’s fierce and compassionate heart, so, too, do I have my father’s creative mind and love of the written word.

And both my parents were very talkative people. Plus, I was the youngest of four kids and therefore grew up listening to everyone else, rarely getting a word in edgewise at the dinner table! The fact that I chose writing as the most effective way for me to sort through and communicate my thoughts and feelings – to an imaginary audience that would let me finish my damn sentence – makes sense.

If there is such a thing as universal intelligence, then it seems sensible for the powers that be to place a future writer within a family of origin who will provide her with the perfect (but not always pleasant) conditions to help ensure that one day, she becomes that writer. Add in the death of a soul mate at a relatively young age AND a guaranteed income for the rest of her life…and you’ve got yourself a writer who really has no choice but to write. Call me crazy, but that almost sounds…logical.

How about you?

Whatever your relationship is – or was – with your father (or the father-like role model/s in your life) what would you say was his greatest gift/s to you? How have you used those gifts – and/or lessons – in your own life? Is there a way you could flip your thinking around and perceive one of his flaws as a hidden gift?

Maryanne Pope is the author of “A Widow’s Awakening.” She also writes screenplays, playscripts & blogs. Maryanne is the CEO of Pink Gazelle Productions and Co-Founder of the John Petropoulos Memorial Fund. To receive her blog, “Weekly Words of Wisdom,” please subscribe here. And be sure to visit our PinkGazelleCards Etsy shop.