Daddyray, good for you for asking questions and being here and trying to become an even better father for your children. I don't have any great advice, but it strikes me that you might just start talking to your son and telling him sort of what you've said here: that you want to do better, that you want to help, that you love him dearly, that you didn't have a great role model and you'd like to make it different for him. You can apologize for being impatient and tell him you're working on it. That alone would give him a great model of how to try to start working on improving oneself.
You could check out some books about fathering. I'm not sure of any titles, although one was recommended in another thread called, "Father, The Family Protector." you might also check out the Teens forum in the Parenting-Ages and Stages area of this website. Maybe you could find advice there. A general patenting book that I really found helpful is called Unconditional Parenting. It's very different from typical thought, but I really loved the ideas. Also, Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves by Naomi Aldort was really good and I recognized a lot of bad behavior that my parents/grandparents had used with me in her descriptions and I finally was able to understand why interactions with them felt so bad to me as a child.
It's never too late to change/improve your relationship with your children. They want more than anything to connect with you and know that you love and accept them. Think about how you wish it could have been with your dad, and how you want to be with your son and let that guide you. You'll do great, you obviously care and are trying (I've noticed some other of your posts in other threads). Spend as much time as you can with him, respect who he is, appreciate and celebrate the unique gift that he is!
I hope any of this helps, I just was moved by your earnestness and openness and wanted to respond. Good luck!
