In her sophomore year of high school, her father quit his job and opened a restaurant. It was a risky venture to leave his well paying job to go for broke what with four kids and a wife to support. Everyone was holding their breath, but somehow he managed to make a success of it. That didn’t mean it was not hard on a teen age girl who wanted new clothes, new shoes, and regular trips to the beauty parlor.
She was a confirmed “Daddy’s Girl” even though they went round and round about all things daughters fight with their fathers about… mainly sex and boys. He had raised her to be a strong independent thinking young woman. They spent many hours together talking over history, politics, literature, and show business. The rest of the family wasn’t as interested in these topics as the two of them, so they went to a separate room for their tete-a tetes.
She became the one child who held his liberal beliefs close to her heart. They fought over every decision she made about boyfriends and her sexual awakening. He hadn’t realized that he created a monster until she began to develop and act out on all the liberal ideals he had groomed her with. It was too late for reform; the damage had already been done.
She threw all his arguments right back in his face and challenged him at every step. He put more pressure on her. He wanted her to be the best she could be. Her tutelage consisted of diet, exercise, singing lessons, dancing lessons, auditions for plays, rigorous studying of the humanities, and memorizing dramatic soliloquies. He coached her at every step.
When she began to demand her independence from him by seeking out the companionship of older boys, he put his foot down and locked her up on total restriction. She rebelled, acted out, snuck out, made out, and came out as the talented, beautiful, intelligent, sex bomb he had created. Their fights escalated to nightly dramas acted out between the two of them with the rest of the family hoping none of the flotsam and jetsam would come their way.
She asserted her independence at every step until she finally turned eighteen. He didn’t fight with her any more. After five years of constant battle, the war ended and she moved out. He never gave up on her, and she remained “Daddy’s Girl” her whole life.
“Happy Birthday, Dad,” she thinks to herself. He had been dead for twenty years, but she still talked to him almost every day. He left an indelible mark on her. He would be with her forever… living or dead. #DaddysGirl
(First published 12/13/12)
