Searching for Ghosts

I didn't have much of a father growing up. An unbiased observer would have called him a hermit or a loner or a trash-picking, self-centered, abusive, loathsome jerk. Being biased, I refused to name him, denying his presense completely. When he sat at the dinner table, shirt off and skin sweaty, I made him absent, neither seeing or smelling him. When his temper grew beyond control and his voice shook the house, I used my mind to silence him and to put right the tilted picture frames on the wall. When he walked throughout the house naked, an emporer proud to be without clothes, I found within myself the magic words that made him vanish. This man failed to keep me safe from attack; making him disappear didn't rob me of protection.

I sought out with intention the very softest and gentlest of soulmates, one who was without aggression, abusiveness, and anger. God, who could be father in spite of me, sent a man into my life who was more likely to whisper than to yell and to hold me than to hurt me. And with this man, God also granted me a long forgotten wish.

When I first met my husband's father - who was everything a dad should be - he didn't have a clue what to do with me, to expect of me, or to say to me. To an only child who'd raised only sons, the perspectives and intentions of an intelligent young woman were foreign territory. A busy man who'd taken all bread-winning responsibility - leaving hands off as his wife solely managed child-rearing - he had never known a woman like me. It took at least a decade for him to recognize my daughter-hood, and for me to trust him with a daughter's heart. But once the unfamiliarity of loving a younger girl and trusting an older man were dusted away, we fell quite effortlessly into a place of nurturing wonder and eager, hopeful warmth. When he would sign messages to me with a simple "Love, Dad" the joy I felt must've been measured out into a vacuum of sadness in my heart, for it always caught me by surprise as it spilled out of me in tears.

He never missed an opportunity to tell me he was proud of me - of how I was raising my sons and how I cared for my students. He knew when to encourage me, and he also knew when to guide me away from dangerous or destructive thoughts. He worried about me when I got sick and asked me frequently about current diagnoses and new treatments. He was patient with me during days of depression, and supportive of me when I felt like I was up against the world. In all things and in all ways, he had an economy with words. But he spared nothing in showing his happiness with loud laughter, his confidence with unwavering eye contact, and his love with unrestrained tears. He was as lavish with his love for me as with any of his children.

When he visited in the fall of 2006, I had just completed the process of applying for promotion to the rank of Professor. He was eager to look over the volumes of documentation I'd created, and because he knew my field and was a scholar himself, his review had extra value to me. It made me feel so wonderful to see his pride in me! One week after he arrived, the ballots were cast among senior faculty in my department, and I was notified that my work was insuffient for promotion. I felt weak and empty when I returned to my family with the news.

Having that mysterious second-sense that loved ones do, he knew what had happened as soon as he saw me and outrage took over his expression. Although I trusted this man with my heart - completely - as soon as I felt tears returning to my eyes, I made my way to another room to cry in private.

He followed me. He hovered just on the edge of my peripheral vision as I emptied a dishwasher and straightened a countertop. When I couldn't avert my face any longer, I looked up to find him crying. He reached out for me and held me and said words to me that I coninue to hold close.

"You Are So Strong."

Not "what fools they are," or "how could they be so stupid," or "damn them - you should quit!"

Instead four simple words. An insight into who I have been in the past, and an observation about who I am today, and a promise about who I will be tomorrow. Strong.

Economy of words. Knowing my heart. Loving me and caring for me.

Dad got on the airplane the next day to return home. And then, the next day, Dad died.

The year that followed was a difficult one. My appeals to promotion committees and provosts went ungranted. My multiple sclerosis robbed me of concentration and left in it's place a new level of depression. And post-traumatic-stress-disorder bled fears and rage into my rational mind. Somehow - I'm still amazed by it - with the help of the gentle, patient man I'd married and the insight and advice of caring friends - I made my way through, around, and over these obstacles. I pushed my paperwork to the level of my University's President, and although this had never been done successfully before, he overturned all of the negative decisions that had preceded his. I scoured every source I could find on cognitive losses and poured myself into brain exercises to compensate for anything that multiple sclerosis might try to take away. And I began to face my rape and PTSD and the way that memory can attach and distort and cripple.

I also harbored an irrational hope that there would come a special day when I'd hear his voice again. A little reassurance, his image once again in my peripheral view. A ghost, albeit. I'd accepted his death. I just needed to see him, to hear him on more time. And I needed that so badly that I came to believe that I would.

A year passed - of promotion paperwork and brain scans and psychotherapy. Though I listened for his voice in quiet moments and looked for his face in windows and around corners, I didn't find his ghost. When I gave up on my hope of seeing him, when I let go of my need to hear his voice again, it was then that I realized where he had been all year long.

I protect my pride and I rarely take on a task that I'm not sure of completing. To have forced my credentials upon one academic after another would never have been my style. But whether I recognized it or not, at every turning point along my path to promotion, dad's voice said, "You are so strong." Knowing that, without consciously hearing it, I was able to push past everything that stood between me and the rank I'd earned.

I made a "deal" with God when I was diagnosed with MS - I'd give up my balance and my gait and my mobility as long as I could keep my mind. When it began to appear that my memory, my concentration, and my problem solving ability were gradually leaving me, I was more than willing to give up on living. With the words, "You are so strong," playing softly in my mind, I learned new ways of thinking and creating that I'd never understood before.

For at least thirty years, I was blessed with a wall around childhood memories of being attacked. When flashbacks and irrational fears found their way through cracks in that wall, I recalled full-force and repeatedly the horror of being terrified and victimized and almost destroyed. I had friends to listen and to comfort, and a husband to guide me from my frightened child to my protected adult. And reflecting on that time I now am sure that the words, "You are so strong," helped me face my sadness, my anger, and my grief.

I still wish I could hear his voice again. I still ache for the secure warmth of his strong embrace. Even though I have his picture pasted or hung or on display in every room, I still long for his smile. My search for his ghost, however, no longer takes me to places away. I'm learning to find peace when I'm frightened and to be stirred from depression's sleep. I'm learning to put away the crutches and swords that I've relied on to carry me and defend me from a monster long-since gone. By recognizing and believing in the inner strength that he revealed, I am learning to let go and to walk on.