Call Me a Greek Tragedy
There is always a bonus when you pay someone to listen to your problems: you discover nothing is your fault. It was your parents’ fault. Being this Sunday is Father’s Day, that one day of the year we acknowledge and thank our fathers for participating in that drunken wrestle with mom all those years ago, I thought we should talk about Daddies.
I’ve always been a Daddy’s girl; and as a kid, I didn’t think I’d ever find a man I loved as much as my Daddy. (Okay, so that part’s true. See, my therapist is right.) But clearly parental-child relationships are…well…not ideal. We want them to be ideal, but we’re never really happy with the outcome, are we? We want our fathers to spend more time with us, to care about our interests (respect our interests), and hug us more.
We’d also like them to not tell us we look like mutton dressed as lamb when we proudly come out in a new dress and show off. And to stop pushing us to be schoolteachers—and to believe that our writing is wonderful. And for God’s sake, stop telling me Amy’s essay was better than mine! And while we’re on it, where the hell is my hug? Sorry, sorry, having a moment.
So we want more hugs if we weren’t hugged enough; or we want less hugs (and hovering) and stop being so darned overprotected. It’s never exactly what we think is right. Of course you were an unhappy teenager with non-ideal parents: all teenagers are. You’re not a case-study, I assure you.
And that’s if you’re lucky enough to have a Dad. What about those of us whose Daddy died when we were young—and there was no stepfather at all or there was a stepfather, but he wasn't a Daddy to us? What about Daddies who divorced mom and you only saw them occasionally? Absentee Dads are the biggest blame games we’ve got for explaining why grown women are having trouble trusting men and picking the right man to love.
It seems insane to me to blame your parents for how you are as an adult, because as an adult you know better. You’ve read the articles; you’ve watched Oprah! You’ve been around the block; you probably have some kids and know how hard it is to parent—and you’re only doing the best you can with your handicaps. So were they! Suddenly all the neurotic crap your parents saddled you with seems rather normal. But the fact remains: your parents made you how you are.
Which can make or break you in the Dating and Marriage Line. If you didn’t get enough “male” fatherly attention as a kid, you’re going to be looking for it as soon as possible and usually find it in all the wrong ways. You didn’t get enough hugs? Teenage boys will hug you; hell, I had some twenty-somethings who were dying to hug my hug-deprived self. If you didn’t have constant reassurance that you were beautiful and smart and worthy, the compliments of insincere boys looking to get laid is almost overwhelming. And you end up “thanking them” most inappropriately—and then realize later they didn’t really mean it.
There is the flipside to this: if none of those boys paid you those compliments either, you are then validated universally that you are a troll and you end up having the suicide hotline on speed-dial just so you could get out of bed in the morning. You’re really damned if you do, damned if you don’t. You’re better off if you just have a Daddy who loves you and you know it—but as we discover in our stories every day, love is hard to express, especially for guys. It’s no wonder we’re all in therapy, blaming Dad that we’re unsuccessful in forging relationships with men. After all, even if we seek someone who is the opposite of our fathers, we still find ourselves attached to fallen gods. People who aren’t perfect, who hurt you even when they don’t mean to.
My Dad is not the huggy type, but eventually I learned if I wanted to be told ‘I love you’ and hugged, I had to do it first. He was actually trainable, even at his advanced age. And I learned to recognize the qualities he did have: capable, trustworthy, humble, hard-working, and didn’t live beyond his means. (I didn’t realize how important the last quality was until I met men who were life-debtors! It used to annoy me as a kid because it seemed we never had money for anything. We clearly didn’t have a lot, but at least we did have a pot to piss in and a window to toss it out of.) And he’s funny, even if his self-deprecating humor turns on you. (Though I’ll never find that mutton dressed as lamb amusing.)
Dad even patiently showed me how to drive the stick-shift the other day when I asked; and the last time he tried to teach me, I literally ended up throwing the entire car into a ditch when I shifted from third to reverse! (You’d think he wouldn’t have wanted a repeat performance.) And last Sunday, he took me gooseberry picking, telling me the best spots to find gooseberries—and silently reminding me the importance of the simple things and also that the best things in life are the things you do for yourself and take time to do. (If you picked gooseberries, you’d understand: thorny little buggers!—and not nearly the amount of berries for the quality and quantity of time you’ve invested! No wonder they’re $3 a can in the store!)
So this long-winded tribute made me think of fathers in our fiction. Help me out: how many of your characters are in therapy because of their parents? Do your characters have parents? Or are you like me and tend to kill off the parents at the beginning of the story (in a Harry Potter fashion)? Do you think about how characters’ parents influenced how they behave in the book (think: Stephanie Plum) and do you try to incorporate (probably unconsciously) neuroses based off their childhoods (and lack of perfect parental treatment)? Are there any “Dads” in any novels that come to mind as “great Dads” or notable fathers? (The Dad in the Bridgerton series is dead and his absence does influence the characters. Stephanie Plum’s Dad doesn’t talk, but eats roast beef and grunts. In Desperate Duchesses, Roberta was ashamed of her Dad because he wasn’t…exactly civilized and embarrassed her with his poetry.) And lastly, what will you be doing for Father’s Day? I suspect Dad will be wanting roast beef.
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41 comments:
Hi Hellion, am popping back in while taking a little break and waiting to hear about a story.
I think that in the world of our romance stories parents play an even greater role than in real life. (I refuse to comment on the issue of parents in the real world wrecking kids' lives on the grounds that it might incriminate me. I have teens at home who would tell you they're suffering!).
Most of my characters suffer from family loss or trauma, but then that's partly because I write category romance and I can't fill the pages with the heroine's six brothers and keep the focus on the love story. Similarly if I want my character to be out on a limb, with no help available, driven to desperate measures, that won't work if they've got a loving family next door to help them. I remember saying longingly to my editor that just once I'd love to give my character a huge family, because I was tired of killing of relatives (for perfectly sound reasons). She just laughed.
I find though that I need to be careful to ensure that, while my character may be influenced by past bad family experiences (or good ones for that matter), they're not just a walking bundle of hang ups. I want them to take some responsibility for who they are and how they behave. Otherwise I fear they wouldn't engage the reader, or me for that matter.
Great topic, Hellion! And I hope you all have a lovely Fathers' Day. Here in Aus that doesn't happen until Sept. Whew!
Annie
A couple of weeks ago at Mother's Day I wrote a blog over at Romantic Inks that pointed out the obvious---parents get a raw deal in romances. There's a kind of shorthand---cold father/mother, son who cannot commit kind of thing. In my own stuff the parents have been neglectful. And frequently dead.
Some people feel you don't come into your own as an adult unless your parents ARE dead---I'm not willing to go that far. But as you pointed out, I've discovered everybody in life pretty much does the best they can. It's not like they set out to be evil or incompetent parents or that the kids were saving their goodness for another family. Human beings are complicated.
Hope your dad has a great Father's day---cause he's got a great daughter.
How lovely this blog is.
I have parents in my stories, though they are more background than anything.
I sure hope I get to meet your dad someday. I have to shake the hand of the man who made you our brilliant Hellion. LOL!
I have a hard time shopping for mother's/father's day cards. I love my parents but they had a very *laid-back* approach to parenting. Basically, if they got us to 18 still breathing, they were good. Providing anything else (other than a healthy dose of guilt for said breathing) was not in their job description. Braces? Ha! Bedtime? Right. Nutrition? Huh?
In my WIP, my heroine has major issues that stem from her dad walking away when she was four. He married someone else, had a new daughter, and never looked back. No birthday cards, no graduation present, no holiday visits. Just replaced she and her mother as if they were disposable. Which means baggage, baggage, baggage.
But just so it doesn't seem like I make all parents look bad, the heroine's mother is awesome and well adjusted and the hero is fine even though he didn't grow up with a father either. He did have his grandfather so he had a positive male role model but still, his father walked away too.
Most any neuroses we have as adults stems from something in our past. Be it not fitting in as a child, moving frequently, a traumatic experience or losing a parent in any way, it all forms us. So it only makes sense to have these subjects in our Romances. You can never get to your HEA until you deal with your UEB (unhappy ever before).
My WIP has dead parents all around, though I have been wondering about introducing a mom to Julian. Though I'm not sure how she would be involved in the plot. I was thinking she could be uninvolved or interested in France and only show up later.... Dunno.
I hope your Dad enjoys Father's Day too.
I'm killing off my main character's father in the first chapter. Her mother will die in the second book. Her mother is resentful of her living. I can't wait to kill her off.
I dunno. My father and I are a lot alike. I don't like to be touched. Or hugged. Or made feel awkward. Sudden outbursts of emotion make my skin crawl. Jeez, I sound like a boy.
My dad used to take me remote control airplane flying with him when I was really little. And he let me have the radio one time. He calmly told me what to do even though I knew he wanted to take it back five seconds after he handed it to me. He also made me a basketball goal and didn't mind that I beat a patch raw in the yard. Or that I break the lawnmower every time I touch it.
My mother taught me how to drive. I can remember the first time I made a left hand turn from Providence to Stadium and cut off half the traffic. My mother looked like ghost and her eyes were really wide, but hey, I did it and didn't kill anyone.
Great blog!
I forgot the daddy questions. My Dad passed away almost 3 years ago and I've had a hard time with Father's day since. I feel better this year about it since my son is getting bigger and now it feels more about it being my husband's day than my father's.
But, I was a daddy's girl too. My dad and I were similiar, not just in features but temperament, while my sister and brother favor my mother in those ways, all a little bit more shy and introverted than me.
I think the point of this blog (I didn't realize it before) is that no matter how old we get, how much taller or mature or whatever, inside we're always that 7-year-old little girl, insecure and in need of our daddies to make things right. I think that is why so many people show up on Dr. Phil and say they have trouble in relationships--and he says it's because of their fathers. It is. We're always going to be 7-years-old.
Which is why when we lose our Daddies, whether we're 7 or whether we're 77, our hearts break and we know nothing will be the same or right again.
I think the same is for mothers and sons. Dad was 66 when his mother died, and he couldn't have looked more lost, lonely or afraid than if he'd been 6.
Regardless of how screwed up your parents end up making you, you will always miss them when they're gone. If only because you can no longer yell at them about how much they screwed up your life.
Hi Annie!! Thanks for dropping by the ship!! You're right! Your HP Extras definitely need the more dramatic turn that "orphaned" characters provide. I think HP novels are dramatic in the ways of fairy-tales, and in them, you always have an orphaned character...or some wicked step mother. *LOL* I do think the HP American line *does* allow for less orphaned hero/ines. :) But I could be wrong!
Maggie, I hate to give truth to the "coming into your own" bit, but I did come into my own a bit more after my mother died. I became a lot wilder...a lot more pirate. A lot less guilt-ridden. *LOL* And it is funny that not a lot of stories have "nice" parents. Then again, I can only name ONE person in my network of friends who have parents that are NORMAL...and she is the only person of my network who I term "Well-Adjusted." In fact, I kinda look at her as a lab-experiment because I don't know ANYONE else like her. She's the anamoly! She boggles my mind. I can't imagine having that enjoyable of a childhood!
Tiff: thanks! And I have a problem with making my parents rather background. They show up only because I want to prove my characters didn't come from wolves, though that might be more believable! How do you write parents in WIPs believably and yet not obtrusively? There almost needs to be a writing seminar on this: Meet the Parents: How to Create Parent-Child Relationships Within Stories Without Resorting to the Cinderella Syndrome
Terri: my father would think you're being sarcastic if you said you wanted to meet the man who made "brilliant Hellion." For one, he wouldn't know who Hellion is (he wouldn't know who Fran is. You have to use my complete real name)--and even when he did realize it was me you were talking about, he'd think you were kidding. Everyone is a big joker in my family. *LOL*
I love that term: UEB--that's a good term! You should write a blog about it! (Or an article!!)
Lord, Sin, however do you tolerate being in my company if you can't stand emotional outbursts and displays? *LOL* I love your Dad...he reminds me of my dad: quiet, droll, and calm. Always calm. The house can be burning around us and he'd make sure everyone was out and be helping to put out the fire.
Marnee, I'm so sorry. *HUGS* I'm glad you're starting to see Father's Day in a new light again; and I'm right there with you in that I don't know how to introduce parents to my books. At least credibly! Poor Julian with the disinterested mother! *LOL*
It always cracks me up when I call your house and ask for Fran and get the same response everytime - "Who?" LOL!
I'm sure we would have a long chat and he would know I was serious by the end. Though I might not be able to resist the chance to give you a hard time by agreeing with him you should be a teacher.
That is a blog/article topic. I need to write that down somewhere.
Hugs, Marn. It took me until recently to realize that my mother was younger than I am now when she lost her father. He was strong and a natural leader. Things went down hill for my family after he passed and I think my mother believes if he had still been around, he would have taken care of everything. He was her knight in shining armor even though that armor was very tarnished.
Thanks guys. :) I try not to think of the sadness of it and remember good, fun things. Sometimes I hear his voice at random times. Like if I'm standing with the refridgerator door open, not sure of what I want to eat, I can hear him clear as a bell: "It's not an air conditioning unit." LOL!
*ROTF* OMG, that's so something my Dad would say!
I sometimes hear my mother; and I dream about her sometimes. I try to remember the good, fun things too. But still, I know it's hard.
I had some stormy moments with my dad when I was young, but I never doubted that he loved me immeasurably. He was a hugger and a teller and an unusually involved father for a generation that pretty much left child care to women. I still miss him.
My hero has issues with his father, but my heroine is a daddy's girl. Her relationship with her father is much simpler than her relationship with her mother. Loretta Chase has created some interesting fathers in her books, both credibly bad and good. She manages to show their importance without allowing them to become too important.
Marnee, C. S. Lewis in A Grief Observed notes that when someone you love greatly dies, it's not like an appendectomy from which you recover mostly unscathed but like an amputation that leaves you forever without a limb. For me, his analogy seems sadly accurate. When my mother died, my sister said, "We'll go on, but we'll always have a hole in our hearts now." I find that special days make us more aware of the hole. Hugs to you!
Forgot to answer about dads in books. In SEP's It Had To Be You the heroine's father plays a major role even though he dies early on. His will is what moves the story, creates the conflict and brings about the eventual HEA.
I finished Lisa Kleypas' Sugar Daddy and am now reading Blue Eyed Devil. The head of the Travis family is such a great father characters. He can be cantakerous and a total PITA, but you know he loves his children. He's a good old boy hardass, but funny and charming all the same.
BTW - anyone know if the other Travis siblings are going to get their own books? If I figure this out by the end of BED, don't give me any spoilers. LOL!
A wonderful blog as always:)
In my WIP Lacey's dad passed away before the story starts. He was her lifeline in the wake of her mother's alcoholic destruction. Her mother destroys her self esteem. My entire story centers around her trying to realize that she didn't need to change herself to be loved, she just needed to believe in herself and change her circumstances.
Growing up I was a daddy's girl. When he passed away eight years ago I felt like the world stopped. He wasn't one to hug and throw love around, but he was the best man I've ever known. I can remember my mom calling me in the middle of the night when he first got sick and I rushed him to the hospital-because hey I'm the nurse in the family:) I was standing beside his stretcher in the emergency room and he looks up at me and says. "I love you, thank you for always being here for me." I knew at that moment that our relationship had come full circle.
Ter- Yes. I hear Jack is next.
I am tearing up as I am reading everyone's responses. Hellion, I love the title of your talk about involving the parents of your characters in your writing.
The dad and mom play a big role in Nora Roberts' Chesapeake Bay series as adoptive parents and the biological parents play a role, too. I think she does a great job of involving family in her books. I don't know if I am a Daddy's girl per se but he was and still is very supportive--he fixes our garage door and built a swingset for our kids. My husband lost his dad when he graduated from high school and that loss had its impact on all of his family in all different ways.
Loved the blog.
Per usual lately, I have to run in about 5 minutes but finally managed to wrestle the puter away from the (home alllllll summer long and I'm bored, Mom!!!!) kidlets. Not really excelling in the parenting department, myself, lately! :)
Hellion, awesome blog!!! I'm a huge believer in the old parental influence. My therapist has a new summer home thanks to my mom and dad! My Dad was a non emotional, by the book, strict Catholic father who thought praise was akin to spoiling. He got better as he got older, but the damage was done. He's been dead 11 years now and as I get older and continue to raise my own kids I have a whole lot more sympathy for him. I'm afraid as a child I was just a nasty little vindictive upstart that wanted him to pay for my misery. Before he died we made peace (thanks to my DH, who by the way is the exact opposite of my father - no psych degree to figure that one out) and as Maggie said nothing he did was malicious or evil. He was just uniformed and doing the best he could with what he had to work with (which wasn't much when I went a generation back and looked at his parents!).
With age comes wisdom, understanding, compassion and forgiveness... thankfully! Those are great lessons to learn, especially for a character in a book. So, I say, yes I use parental influence in my writing. It's a no brainer for me. It explains a lot of dysfunctional behavior on behalf of your H/H.
Hellion - *hugs* I have dreams about my father too, sometimes so clear that I feel like he's still alive. I think it's their way of staying with us.
Ter - I was 28 when I lost my dad and it was a month after my wedding. Part of me thinks he made it that long because he didn't want to do anything to mess up my big day. He was still in his 50s, too young, I say.
Jack is getting his own book? Huzzah. I love Lisa K's contemporaries! I hope it comes out soon. *LOL*
Amanda, hello! I'm glad I'm the only one weeping at her keyboard, afraid she's going to short circuit the thing. My dad can fix most anything...except that jeep he bought at an auction a few years ago. (He was so excited about buying it too.) Everything else though...
Marnee: 50s is too young. (Then again, for my parents who had me in their late 40s/early 50s, you can see why I think so. *LOL*) And in my dreams, I forget my mother has died..it feels real.
Irish: My Dad is a lot like that, only Protestant instead of Catholic. Praise is akin to spoiling; and any praise doled out is immediately taken back by a thinly veiled back-handed compliment. *LOL* But my Dad was born in 1921, grew up in the Depression, and he had nothing--and we didn't have much more than nothing growing up--so the fact that we're healthy, God-fearing, and born in America--well, that's the best you can hope for. The rest is up to you. And I think he wondered where I came from...*LOL* I was going to college whether anyone approved or not. Watch me. *LOL* And I did, the only one to do so. (Though I didn't get my teaching degree. *LOL*)
Your dad's 87? Goodness! He's sounds so fiesty for that age! I hope I'm still that fiesty at 87.
He's 86. He'll be 87 December 31st. He's feisty. *LOL* Though he naps through more baseball games than he watches. (In his defense, it is a comfortable chair.)
Parent Day at school was a PITA. I hated bringing mom and dad to school with me, because everyone else had young, hip parents, and my parents were old. *LOL* And old-fashioned and embarrassing. And broke. *LOL* "Is that your grandfather?" is what I'd hear everywhere I went. I'd sigh, "NO," as if that should be obvious, "everyone asks that." I'm pretty sure I was an embarrassment right back. He'd get the "Is this is granddaughter?" Dad sheepish: "Um, no, she's my daughter." "Wow, on purpose?"
My Dad died Feb. 3 of this year at the age of 67. Sunday is going to be hard for me as it is also my birthday. Listening to all the commercials about Father's Day is driving me nuts today even though we'll be celebrating it for my darling DH. It'll be a very hard day.
Not to be a Debbie downer, if you'll notice every Disney movie begins or ends up midway with a parent's death or the character has already lost a parent. The theme always is that a child's worst fear is to lose a parent and be left alone. Disney makes a concerted effort to show kids that life goes on and can get better.
In my WIPs, parents are either out of the picture, dead or dying. You got me thinking today, Hellion. Why? Because this scenario packs the most punch and everyone can relate to it just like Disney's theme. I challenge you to think of a Disney movie that has both parents. Look at Bambi, Cinderella, Finding Nemo, Tarzan, etc... with the exception of Sleeping Beauty whose parents are asleep. Just sayin'... :-)
The Incredible! Man, I had to think hard to come up with that. But you're totally right, Kathy. I hate that about Disney films. I never think of it as teaching the kids anything. It's just mean. LOL!
Hellion - my parents get that question all the time about my little brother. They were both 42 when he was born so 60 at his HS graduation. But then they've lived in that same small town forever and people knew they had daughters old enough to have babies. Well, I was 17 but my sister was 20 and out of the house so it could have been her. If she were nicer and could actually get a man.
It seems the situation is harder (not that it's easy in any way) when the lost parent is the head of the family. My friend's mother died about 12 years ago now and she was the glue that kept that family together. They've all fallen apart since her death. It's like watching people trying to walk on ice and never getting their footing. And there's nothing you can do to help them.
I know, Kathy, Disney stories are the worst. And I think part of it has to do with that we can't be adults until our parents are truly out of the picture. (I'm sure there is something Freudian lurking in fairy tales.) *LOL* Plus lots of fairy tales come from the middle ages, and no one lived long then anyway...maybe fairy tales have dead parents because it was a sign of the times MORE than it's a way to force the character to deal with big issues alone. Like in Hero's Journeys, the Mentor always dies in HJs. That's why Dumbledore died. It's why Gandulf died. It's why Obi Wan died. So your parents are your mentor, but on your hero's journey, there comes a point where your mentor must die and you must face the final part of your journey alone with the knowledge your mentor has helped you learn.
Kathy, I'm so sorry to hear about your dad. I know it must be really hard; the first year is always the worst. *HUGS*
Speaking of Finding Nemo, I saw this in the theater. It came out in late May/1st weekend of June some years ago--I remember because I had to work that Saturday to get folders done (story of my life) and to reward myself, I wanted to see Finding Nemo. No idea. And I sat down in the theater, happy with my popcorn, and immediately the mother dies in the first 10 minutes. I was a sobbing wreck for the rest of the film. I went home more depressed...what a stressful movie that was! Black moments galore all over that movie. I had gone to a Disney movie to raise my spirits and take my mind off my PMS, and I wept the whole time!
Forgot to say hugs, Kathy. As much as I'm not the biggest fan of my parents' parenting skills, I can't imagine not having either one of them.
Great blog, Hellion! My book does not have any parents in it. Both the hero and heroine have no parents. Melissa was raised by her aunt and uncle and Jake's parents moved away when he went to college. And no, I'm not writing anything deep or prophetic about abandonment issues....at least not in this book.
I lost my father twelve years ago and there isn't a day that goes by that I don't think of him. He had a bark that you'd swear had a bite to it but he loved us like nobody's business. He was slow to praise us but let everyone else know how proud he was of us.
My mother is a very strong person. She's been through a lot in her life. Not more or less than anyone else but it's shaped who she is and, to a large extent, who I am as well.
This may be a bit irreverant but how about some hot Daddies for Father's Day this Sunday. Hugh Jackman, Colin Firth (who had the great insight to marry an Italian), George Clooney - alright he's not a father but there's some fabulous genes there....
I believe I can fill that Hot Daddy request. LOL! I'm about to fall asleep here at work. Nothing like searching the net for Hot Daddies to wake me up. LOL!
Thanks for the suggestion, Santa. And since I know first hand how wonderful you are, I bet your mother is absolutely terrific.
*LOL* I love the prospect of having some HOT DADDIES to gawk at. Definitely put some up to lighten the blog! :) I adore Colin!
Hugs to all of you mourning your Daddys this Father's Day! Keep the good memories front and center!
Thanks, guys! Sorry for sounding down earlier. It just hits you sometimes. :-)
I agree with you, Hellion. The parental unit is usually gone from the picture in order for the journey to begin, for the character to stretch outside him/herself. It usually takes a push, doesn't it? I have that theme in my books. (Smacks head.)
Hot Daddys! Keep em coming, guys. Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Ben Afleck, Adam Sandler (got to love this guy), McDreamy, Tom Selleck (who still looks yummy), Robert Downy, Jr. in Iron Man. (swoon)
Hugs to all of you out there who have lost people in your lives. Luckily, my parents are still alive but they're in thier 50s. In my stories, the parents are either dead, f**ked up, or nonexistent. I might actually have an upcoming WIP where one set of parents are actually so-called normal. Gasp.
You know... I read somewhere or saw (maybe it was one of the days that Sylvia Browne was on Montel Williams) but that when you dream of a deceased loved one that that loved one is visiting you. It'll be eight years this Christmas Eve that my grandmother died from breast cancer (which spread to her bones), but the day after she died, I had the most vivid dream.
I remember all this whiteness and then I see my grandmother dressed in a blue suit (her burial outfit). She looks like how I remembered her before cancer ravaged her to thinnness. She looks at me and says: I'm in a really good place and I'm fine. I woke up and that night was her wake. I'm not an overly religious person. I try to be spiritual but I definitely think that dream was a visit and letting me know and others that she moved on to a better place.
Great blog, Hellion!
I believe when we dream of our deceased loved ones, they are visiting us to tell us they are okay. To remind us.
Ely, that was a wonderful story! Thank you!
Kathy, don't apologize! It hits me sometimes too...and it's...I understand, we all do.
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