Old Man

You sonofabitch. Do you have any idea how many times I've said "I wish you could have met my father?" I've said it to friends, girlfriends, my wife, my girls - your granddaughters that you didn't bother to stick around for. To the others, who knew you only briefly, I've said, "I wish you could have got to know him better." What was so interesting in that bottle that it was more important than being Grampa Paul?

If you had been a dumb fat fuck, nobody would have missed you. People would have nodded their heads in mock sympathy and said, "He's in a better place now." But you were a bright fat fuck. You had ideas. You inspired people. Remember when you started the company softball team? We were proud to wear those t-shirts, no matter how badly we lost, and we always lost. We had fun, and that was all your fault.

Remember Lily and Fritz from up here? I run into Lily in the village sometimes. Yesterday she told me I walk like you. It's been 30 years since she last saw you, and she remembers how you walked. Who leaves that kind of impression on people? A few years ago, I saw Aunt Belle not long before she died. She had no idea who I was, but when I said "I'm Paul's son," she looked up and whispered "Paul?" with what was left of her feeble voice. I said, "No, I'm not Paul - I'm Paul's son," and she looked away. As far as anybody knows, your name was the last word she ever spoke.

So why'd you do it? What was so terrible about your world that you couldn't face it with all your wonderful wits about you? Why was it that every time you started to get somewhere, every time you began to achieve success in whatever you were doing, you dove back into that bottomless vat of vodka? What the hell were you so afraid of?

Now that I'm almost older than you ever were, it's a bit funny to me that I used to call you "old man;" it brings a smile when my girls call me that. Then a tear, knowing you would have had them call you the same thing. Saddest is that we will never know what you would have called them, only that it wouldn't have been their given names.

Not so funny is that my last words to you were "Call me back when you're sober." And you weren't even drunk that time. Of all the words I've ever said to anybody, those are the ones I wish I could take back. I'm sorry, old man. But much sorrier that you never called me back.