Fathering the Fatherless

I can still remember very clearly, when my son was just a little boy, a father picking his son up from school and lifting him high above the ground in his arms and the smile that shone on both their faces. It would not have been that significant, except that even then, I realized I would never be able to give that to my son. It was bittersweet for me to see the dads with their sons. Playing ball, coaching ball, hunting, fishing. Even at a time I hated my son's father with a passion, I still longed to give him that. On one hand, I had to do everything in my power to keep us both away from him. On the other, I wished 1,000 times over he would just be the dad my son deserved. For whatever reason, reasons I'll never know or understand, he wasn't capable of connecting with my son unless I was part of the bargain. While he complained of never getting to see him, the few times he did were used as opporunities to torment me, by making it obvious he had no interest in our son apart from our being together again. Oh, how I hated him for that. Years would pass, and I would rationalize how he needed his father, many times out of desperation. And I would call him and plead. Beg him to love his own son, to reach out, to do what seemed so impossible for him, yet came so naturally for me. Nineteen years later, he never has, and he probably never will. I don't know which of us made more mistakes. And if I'm being honest, at times I was a mother with my own agenda, with a beast of a hatred for a man I wanted nothing to do with. But mostly I was just a young mother, fathering the fatherless. Something I was neither equipped nor eager to do. At 16, I was barely capable of being a mother. And after all these years, I still see the consequence of my actions. It wasn't my consequence, necessarily. Sure the struggles and inconveniences of raising a child alone were there, but the consequence, to this day, is my son's. If it cuts me to the bone to wonder why his father wasn't there, ever - for one birthday, one Christmas, one baseball game, what must it do to him? In hearing the happy stories of those that have risen above, I give them credit. But I still wonder...what about my son?

To all those fathers who rise to the challenge of being a dad, God bless you. To the mothers and fathers that have bitten their tongues til they bled in order to save their child's feelings about his/her other parent, God bless you. To the parents that have swallowed their pride, given second chances, did what they had to do to raise their child alone, or never gave up on being a part of their child's life...God bless you. And God, please bless my son. Your word says that he was never fatherless. For you are a Father to all of us, and you will not leave us as orphans. I don't know if my son will ever speak to his father, or what kind of father, if ever, he will prove to be. But I know the Father. And He loves my son even more than I ever could. And that just has to be enough.