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Phoenix Rising: The Making of a Single Father
By Michael Evangelista
Issue 116, Jan/Feb 2003
I can't think in straight lines anymore. Plans, worries, even spoken sentences come in broken waves. Focusing on a single task without interruption? Impossible. I am a madman. I am half asleep. I am a single father.
I've had to learn to see double, keeping the big ball rolling while juggling a full complement of sidetracks and minor emergencies. School days are the most hectic, and today is no exception. I'm pulling my boots on, packing lunches, eating a quick breakfast, and jotting down scrambled thoughts from last night's foggy dreaming. Tuesday morning, just as usual.
It hasn't always been this way. I was a devoted dad from the start, but I didn't always pay so much attention to every detail of the children's lives. Their mother and I had taken on surprisingly traditional roles: If I provided food, shelter, and an occasional hand with the basic chores, she seemed content to devote her days entirely to their care. And I was secure in knowing that someone was there for them when I could not be.
From homebirths to cloth diapers, homeschool to home-cooked meals, she was not just a mother but the mother. She birthed and nursed three healthy babies as if it were all she knew. It was not without its struggles and pain, but we were a team and we were going somewhere, rewriting the scripts of our lives one chapter at a time.
And then, suddenly, after the third child was weaned-the third and final act somehow, in her mind, now complete-the lights went down, and a dark, heavy curtain closed behind her eyes. All we saw of her after that was a fleeting glimpse as she slipped through the stage-left door, abandoning her once-fulfilling role as the ultimate natural mother for some other life. She seemed to vanish almost overnight, leaving costumes and props scattered about the stage. Meanwhile, the children and I sat alone in the front row of an empty theater, wondering where to go.
What else could we do but button up our coats against the cold and darkness and move on? We cleaned up the mess, packed up the few belongings that were not sold or given away, and headed out west-to Utah, to Grandma, and to a new beginning.
In the haste and confusion of post-divorce compromise, it seemed best that the youngest child, at the time just two years old, stay in Florida with his mother. She acted as if it were some great, final decision, a permanent way to justify the loss of the other two; for me, it was a desperate sacrifice, in order to gain a little time and speed in getting reestablished on a new frontier.
I spent my days in prayer for him and my nights in tears. I would never suggest that any couple separate their kids, yet even now I'm not sure I could have made that cross-country trip with all three of my children. Letting Ezra stay behind was, by far, the hardest thing I've ever done, but somehow I knew-perhaps because of the ease with which their mother surrendered the other two-that it wouldn't be long before my kids were all reunited. Indeed, within a couple of months the youngest came to join us.
I might have stayed closer and tried to work with her, sharing the kids, swapping schedules, but after many attempts to pacify her ever-changing demands and intentions, it was clear that we could never work out a serious long-term plan. I prayed, worried, and stewed for so long, and then, finally, a voice began to speak up inside of me: "It's okay to believe in yourself. The children need you to be happy."
I want to be able to say, as so many single mothers have told me, that I knew we would be fine, that the children were my life, my joy, all I'd ever need. If the kids remember that time at all, I'm sure they would see me as full of strength, love, and courage. I had to be, for them. But in truth, I have never been so scared and unsure of the future as I was then. My only guidance was that small inner voice. And, as in all the deepest times in my life, I understood that inner guidance is all I ever really have, sink or swim.
The first stage, of stone-cold grieving, was so consuming, and the second phase-keeping everything up and running once I'd stopped moping-was so demanding, that it seems only recently that I've been able to pause and look around. There was one day, just a few weeks ago, when I realized that I'm actually making it work. It's like learning to ride a bicycle and finally getting the courage to look behind you, only to see that the person you thought was holding you upright let go a hundred yards back. "I'm really doing it!" I said to no one but myself, and felt the burden get just a little bit lighter.
I have learned much about life and myself in a very short time. Introspection and analysis have certainly brought some insights, but nothing has taught me more than pain. The world as I had known it turned upside down, and all of my hopes, fears, and understanding ended up in a cluttered pile. At times, in anger, I have tried to reduce the mess of my life, to simplify and finalize the process in one fast cut. And each time I have been shown it is just not that simple, and that the process is a long way from any final place of understanding.
One such attempt at closure was particularly humbling. I came home from work in a rage, determined to make a change. I'd spent six painful months trying to make sense of an experience that seemed entirely senseless. Now I decided it was time to clean house. With dirt on my hands and wet mud still clinging to my boots, I flew in the front door and began tearing through dresser drawers, closets, and kitchen cabinets, determined to throw away or destroy anything that reminded me of her. The shirt from my 21st birthday, the leather coat that had been her brother's-even our worn-out toaster-oven, a wedding gift-all of it had to go. I was starting clean, determined to make my own memories from now on.
I filled two boxes and was standing atop the washing machine, tossing things from the pantry shelves over my shoulder into a third box, when two small voices spoke up behind me. "Whatcha doin'?" "When's dinner?"
I turned to answer the children, at the time just four and five years old, but the words failed to come. In an instant, my balloon of self-empowerment and decisive anger was burst by the tiniest of pins. I can't know whether I was laughing or crying as I realized what I should have seen all along: I would never be truly free of the past. Its memories were here, flesh and blood, pleading in small, sincere voices for my attention. I could toss out the gifts, but I would never be without my kids.
On that day, I took one small step toward making peace with the past, realizing that scars and bad memories are not all that it has given me. Being solely responsible for three children is an incredible burden, but it is also my motivation and my direction. My relationship to them is the axis around which all of my life revolves. As in any relationship, we have our good times and our bad. Sometimes I get afraid or worn down, and I yell a little louder than I should. Other times, when I'm feeling lost and in the dark, it is the kids' love and patience that bring me back to real life, to the moment.
It is certainly true that children are resilient beings, and these kids have bounced back incredibly. So many things seem to have rolled right off them. As a child of divorced parents, I've spent many hours being afraid for my own children and the pain that I know they will carry their whole lives. Though I tell myself that I am not to blame, I have felt my share of guilt over letting them suffer. But there is a flaw in this emotion, for often it is the guilt itself that hurts them. It weighs so heavily on me that I am less than my best for them. I have learned that my kids don't expect me to be sorry or perfect; they just want me to be myself and to love them. I continue to stumble, and they continue to wait, smiling, for me to stand again. I know I am the grown-up, but I realized long ago that they are also raising me.
Now that I have all three of the children with me, it seems logical that I should be able to simply remove the faulty wiring and make a nice, smooth reentry into normal life. Contrary to all of my rational, male instincts, however, I've had to accept that logic is powerless against the raw, hard force of emotional disaster. Rather than smashing down the past, I must instead learn to carry it, accept it, and build upon the rocky foundation of my early life. This is more than living; it is growth and survival.
The best thoughts, it seems, come during the times when I can embrace the entire drama of my life-the pain, the fear, the endless and demanding work, the memories. All of these are moving to form me, to shape my growth. This is my life, and every moment, good or bad, is a piece of who I am and who I will become.
My good friend Thomas was losing his body to systemic cancer. The last time I saw him I was at the peak of my divorce and emotional distress; I couldn't eat, rarely slept, and had taken up smoking and self-pity as full-time habits. And here was my friend, a husband and father, chronically coughing, painfully slipping over to the other side. Yet Thomas refused to frown or feel sorry for himself or for me. He had seen the true beauty that is beyond all of our agony, and he knew that sometimes the hardest parts are the most important.
Despite his own pain, Tom looked at me with utter compassion. He held his arms in close like a cradle, and said, in a voice that wanted only to rest, "When I am angry, I rock my anger like a baby. I hold it and I nurture it, and after a while, it stops crying."
Of all the talking, listening, thinking, and explaining I've done in this past year, no words have been nearly as relevant or as humbling as these. When I can hold the suffering and sadness in my heart, and look with eyes that continue to see beauty, it is then that I truly am alive.
Each day there are a hundred mistakes and a thousand chances to do better. Life has become a series of challenges, triumphs, and defeats. My heart is often heavy, but my mind knows that I am free to begin, over and over, to make the best of what I have been given. Some nights, all I can do is crash and burn; but in the morning, like some mythical bird, I arise out of the ashes for another try at flying.
For additional information about fathers with custody, see the following article in a past issue of Mothering: "What Do You Do?" no. 74.
Michael Evangelista lives in Kanab, Utah, with his children, Kyla (10), Judah (8), and Ezra (6); his fiancée, Avery; and her daughter, Shandi (5). He is the assistant editor of the Southern Utah News.
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