porter_inc: (fic)
porter_inc ([personal profile] porter_inc) wrote2006-03-10 08:21 pm
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Topic 116: My father

[OOC: Once Will is granted posting access to [livejournal.com profile] theatrical_muse, this will be posted there. However, I wanted to post it in his journal before too much more time passed.]



Tobias Alan Porter considered himself to be a man's man. Before he died, he would regularly regale me with tales of his service in the Army, making sure that I knew what it was to be a "real" man. After his service, he'd gone to work for the company I'm currently with, Hamilton-Fairhaven Savings and Loan. Not only did my father become an executive with them - a sure way to secure a position for me once I was ready for the working world - he was friends with the Hamilton. He's still a bit of a legend there.

I know he worried about me. Rather, he worried about me embarrassing him by doing something he would never approve of me doing. I remember one particular incident, when I was about ten years old. As a child, I would constantly write stories. If someone was looking for me, they'd more than likely find me bent over a notebook, scribbling furiously as I tried to get my latest adventure story out of my brain and onto the page before it faded forever. It was one of these days that Dad found me. I don't know if he was having a bad day or if he'd had enough of me constantly writing, but I remember him ripping the pencil and notebook out of my hands and throwing them in the garbage.

He didn't want his son, he later informed me, growing up to be some kind of fruit who sat around writing shit all day when there was real work to be done in the real world. One day I'd understand that he didn't go to the office every day because he wanted to but because he had to. The man was a walking billboard for job satisfaction with that little gem. Considering he was an educated man, I never understood how close-minded he could be about things like my writing, though. I knew the man liked books - I'd even seen him read a few - but it wasn't until I was older that I understood it had nothing to do with the writing. His issue was my staying indoors writing instead of trying out for football or basketball or whatever other show of manhood in which he wanted me to take part. I did make the tennis team at my high school, and he still seemed a bit disappointed in that, but, as he said, it was better than nothing. Mind you, the only sport I'd ever seen him play was when he'd pick up a beer and watch a football game on television.

Growing up, I would hear from my mother just how terrified (her words) my father was of my becoming a fag. Though she never actually said the word "fag," she made it clear what exactly my father feared. Yes, I know, I could feel the love, too. I would ask her how he could think I would ever do something like that, she would smile knowingly at me, kiss my cheek and tell me that she would love me no matter what. (My mother's been my biggest fan for as long as I can remember. Shout out to Mom!)

My best friend, Peter, was the main target of my father's scorn because Dad had labeled him as a queer, and, damn it, his son wasn't going to be friends with some queer. Yet, somehow, my mother was able to negotiate on my behalf so I could remain friends with Peter. I never thought about what she'd have to do, though it was hinted at later. And by hinted, I mean I overheard them arguing about it one night. Suffice it to say, she must have loved Peter as much as she loved me in order to do those things for my father. She still adores Peter, and I wonder if she ever told him about how bad she had it.

I don't want to make my father out to be an ignorant, intolerant ass who kept his son so afraid of disappointing him, he wasn't able to really live until after the old man died, but... Well, I can't honestly say that wasn't true. I loved my father because I had to. But, sorry, old man, you were an ignorant, intolerant asshole, and my life didn't begin until the day yours ended.

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