Cynde's thoughts: A Letter to My Father

I wrote this back in 2012, and a lot has changed since then.

Dear Dad,
You left us before I had a chance to be your friend and not just your child. Our time together was too short so I never got the chance to say thank you. Because I will admit now that I was a difficult teenager with all the typical drama, sarcasm, and tension only a teenage daughter can create. (I'm so glad I only had to raise boys.)

You were a 50s dad, quietly working, providing food and clothing for the family but never saying much. And I was a teenager who was not interesting in listening the few times that you spoke. Or so I thought. But over the years, your voice, your memories, your singing, comes to life in my head, so I must have been listening.

Remember when I used to roll my eyes and ignore you when you sang to your Newfoundland records? Well guess what, I somehow know all the lyrics to the old timer songs and listen to them all the time. Last time I back in Newfoundland I was in an antique store and found that Dick Nolan album with your favourite song, Fiddler's Green, on it. I crying right there on the spot and babbled to the store clerk that my dad used to sing that song when he was homesick. I lovingly packed it in my suitcase when I left.

I will admit that I'm my mother's daughter; I have her temperament, her personality, and her manners which must have aggravated you as it's well documented that you two did not see eye to eye. However, you did give me two things I'm very proud of.
Because of you, I know my heritage. I may not have been born there but I'm a proud Newfoundlander. In your quiet way you showed me the resilience of my people and their heritage. I can't help tapping my feet when I hear a good jig.

And the second thing you gave me? I can't separate the Fred Durnford from the Captain Fred Durnford. You were a captain, a leader of men, a ship driver. You were never comfortable on land. I may have had my mother's personality but I wanted to BE you. I wanted to be on the deck of a ship, smell the salt air, and feel the waves under my feet. I can't imagine living away from water, never have in my whole life. I became a sailor because of you. For that I am eternally grateful.

So dad, thank you for being you and for teaching me things even when I wasn't listening.
Your loving daughter, Cynde

What changed since this time is that I found out dad was not my biological father, something that I've known in the back of my head my whole life but finally with DNA test was able to confirm. But, everything that I've posted is still true. I'm still a proud Newfoundlander and I'm still proud of my dad. No wait, I'm more than proud of him, I'm in awe.

See, my family split up 8 months after I was born and we moved to Florida, leaving my father and brother in Montreal. I really don't know the reason my brother was left with my dad because he was very close to our mother. But having found out that my father knew that I wasn't his child probably had something to do with it, he had the upper hand so to speak.

But here's the deal. I didn't meet my father until I was about 7 years old when I went up to Canada. I don't remember this but I've been told that we were at a party in my Aunt Verna's basement when we met and I sat on his lap the whole night, didn't budge. People also told me that apparently I didn't notice the scars on his face or his stump of a hand, nor did I flinch away.

When I found out he wasn't my biological father I reached out and told my cousins with the news. One cousin who is my sister's age told me that she knew, they all knew but didn't want to say anything to me to protect me. I asked how she knew and she said your father told my mother.

He knew. He always knew and he accepted me unconditionally. He really didn't have to but he did. And that makes me in awe of him.