Sins of the Father

You're 6 when you realize that your father doesn't have a normal job. Yes, you know that "we" own a record store, but you also observe that not everyone who comes into the record store actually buys any music. You are that kind of kid, observant, watchful… Nosey. So you watch as money exchanges hands with no records sold. Yet, those customers run gleefully out the door as if they were just given the new Michael Jackson album for free.

You're also 6 when you are awakened in the middle of the night. Indiscernible words from voices that are clearly recognizable.

 "Call 911!"

"Man, are you crazy? All this coke in here."

"Yo! He's seizing; he could die, man."

"We gotta hide this coke first."

You instinctively know not to come out of your room, not even to use the bathroom. So you lay awake all night trying, unsuccessfully, not to wet your bed while contemplating why the police will be mad that there is coke-a-cola in your house. You finally conclude that this must be why you are not allowed to drink coke: it's bad for you and the police don't like it. But why do they sell it in the stores? It takes another two years when you realize the difference between coke and 'coke'. Still too young to be distinguishing between the two.

At age 10 it dawns on you that none of your friends have thousands of one dollar bills wrapped in rubber bands hidden in the bottom of their closets. That's where their shoes are stored; not under their beds like yours. None of them get their lunch money from bundles of cash hidden in their room. They get checks made out to the school in beautifully written cursive. If they do get cash, it's a twenty from mom's purse or dad's wallet. And they don't get sideways glances from the judgmental lunch ladies who always give you one of two looks as you pay: disgust or pity.

Without the explicit explanation of what 'this' is, you're constantly told that "all of this is for you, my children that I love so much". You carry this with you. As you grow, you slowly understand the implications of “this”. In some ways your very existence has caused the, once beautiful, teacher and mother of three across the street her family, job, and looks. At 12, you feel responsible for the loss of her livelihood.

At age 15, you begin to wonder if every drug addict you see in your, now rundown, neighborhood is supplied by the same man who used to spend his time passing out milk to your friends in elementary school. This is not the neighborhood of your childhood.

You're 17 when your entire world changes as your father is taken from you. While you know he is guilty as sin, you still hope, pray and beg that he will be coming home soon. That somehow the last 15 years of your life has been someone else's. That it is not your father in that orange jumpsuit sitting across from you in the crowded visiting room of the county jail. That is not your father. Your father would never make you a fatherless child. Never make you a fatherless daughter. Never make you a statistic. But he has.

Although you are not the one who committed the crime you are embarrassed.  You dread that in inevitable question that always comes whenever you let someone in close: where is your father? There's always a pause while you search for the courage to answer truthfully. And in those quickly passing moments, the look in your companions’ eyes always gives away their fear of having asked the wrong question. Maybe he died... maybe she doesn't know where he is. Sometimes you think it may be better to answer this way. You never do. You realize that you are, nonetheless, ashamed. You are 22.

At 26, you now have three children. The idea of ever doing anything that would separate them from you is unimaginable. Yet, you now know that you will do whatever it takes to keep them fed, clothed, safe, and even a little spoiled. And as that third child, a son, is born, you begin to ponder what his life will be. How hard will it be? Because you know that simply due to the fact that his mama is black and his daddy is Mexican, his life will be so much harder than others. What will he have to do to survive? To care for his family? You vow to never let history repeat itself.

So what exactly do you do when you know the father you adore so much helped to destroy the neighborhood, culture, the life that you loved? It isn't until you are 30 that you realize that you have to love him anyway, especially in those times you find yourself hating what he did the most. You must remember that the sins of the father are not your own.