My parents divorced in December 1952, and my father married Pearl in September 1955. At the time of their marriage, I was less than 8 years old. Strangely, I have no recollection of Pearl until after he married her. Before my father married Pearl, I remember him being a casual part of my life. After my father married Pearl, my father was just another person I would periodically see at family events. All my friends would talk about their fathers, but I remained silent when they spoke. Even though I had an absentee father my mother’s father (Grandpa Beck) and my father’s brother (Uncle Al) became surrogate fathers to me. Later in this blog, I will go into more detail about how these two men positively influenced my life and gave me refuge and emotional support when I needed it most.
Since my father was a relatively compliant and accommodating man, I have always believed that Pearl strongly influenced my father’s relationship with me. As I grew, I frequently received comments such as “You look exactly like your father.” If Pearl heard these comments, I know that these comments must have galled her since they validated a prior marriage. I did not need to be a clairvoyant to sense Pearl’s resentment.
Fifteen months later, in December 1956, my father and Pearl had their only child, a baby girl called Lilline (“Lil”). I am certain Pearl’s attention was directed towards mothering my half-sister. I never knew of Pearl having a job outside the home, so most of her attention must have been directed towards Lil and my father. On the other hand, my father worked full-time in the automotive industry and somehow had to fit a wife, a daughter, his relatives, friends, and sometimes a son into his life. Based upon conversations with other family members, Pearl was overly protective of Lil to the point that there was minimal contact with Lil and my father’s side of the family. I seldom saw Lil, so I never developed a close relationship with her.
Later in life, my father became seriously ill with a reoccurrence of cancer. He had conquered cancer once, but the second bout was not beatable. At the time my father and Pearl lived in Missouri so they could be close to my half-sister Lil. Lil had moved to Missouri to follow the man she was dating. Through family members, I learned that my father did not want to live in Missouri but wished to remain in Saginaw, but Pearl demanded that they leave the town where he had lived his entire life. His family and friends lived in Saginaw, and he felt he had lost most of his social contacts.
When I learned that my father was ill, I asked Uncle Al if he thought Pearl would allow me to visit him. Uncle Al momentarily pondered and said, “Let me get back to you on this. I’ll try to figure out what is going on.”
A few days later Uncle Al called me back and said, “John, it would not be a good idea to visit your father. Pearl has been angry with you for your entire life and it has only gotten worse with your father’s cancer. If you visited your father, Pearl would lash out at you, and it would upset your father.” So, I did not visit my father in his dying days because of Pearl.
Several months later, my father passed away. He was a kind and friendly person who was very passive and married to a woman with intermittent uncontrolled anger. Since I had limited contact with my father my entire life, and usually not positive interactions given Pearl’s outbursts, I did not feel as if my father had died…I felt that another person I happened to know had died. I feel sad and guilty about feeling this way, but the truth is that my father was never an active participant in my life. I never knew him more than through periodic and superficial contact, so we never bonded nor formed a loving father-son relationship. We conducted our lives independently of each other but, ironically, within the same familial sphere. In short, I grew up without a father.
(The 2nd installment of “Pearl and the Death of My Father” will continue next Wednesday)
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