Of fathers, love, and money

I talked with my ex-husband this morning, and it was the usual heartbreaking, frustrating discussion that led us nowhere new. I realized as we spoke that this man and I see reality, and love in particular, in two different ways.

For him, love is not a feeling. He does not seem to experience affection. Instead, love means for him a set of obligations and behaviors. His love is limited and conditional, something that has to be earned with right conduct and right beliefs. And so, his sees his obligation to his children as material and predicated on their meeting their own obligations to him—obligations that include the conforming of their lives and personalities to his specifications.

“Don’t worry,” he said in a bitter voice. “I fully intend to divide my estate between the three of them when I die — but it’s disgusting to think they’d waste their lives waiting for an inheritance.”

“It’s not your money they want,” I pleaded with him. “It’s your love.”

But he just stared at me, unable to comprehend. If love is money, then what do the kids need with love? And how can he love them if they continue to insist on being other than the way they ought to be? What insolence!

As I drove back home and the tears were shed and dried, I started to think about my own father. He left me only a couple hundred dollars when he died last spring. He had no other money to give, but he instead, he offered me an inheritance more precious than the riches of the richest men on earth:

he gave me love while he lived.

My father loved me through it all, from start to finish. In his often clumsy ways, he dedicated his life and his work to his children and to all children. He forgave me even when I was cruel to him, and when I argued with him, he engaged me with all his heart and open mind.

My father was honest with me and honest in his dealings with the world. He let me go when I wanted to go and yet remained close by so he could help me when I needed a hand. Over time, he became a beacon for me of the steadfast light of the Loving Creator, a model of a life lived with integrity. I never heard him express hatred or disdain for another person.

He father was kind to me. My father loved me. This was his gift, his heirloom of love, and because of this gift, I will die in a state of grace and peace and self-acceptance. I will sing my way across the river, just like he did.

My father left me a couple hundred dollars when he died.

What will my children inherit from their father that can compare?