Tanzan and Ekido were once travelling together down a
muddy road. A heavy rain was still falling.

Coming around a bend, they met a lovely girl in a silk
kimono and sash, unable to cross the intersection.

"Come on, girl," said Tanzan at once. Lifting her in
his arms, he carried her over the mud.

Ekido did not speak again until that night when they
reached a lodging temple. Then he no longer could
restrain himself. "We monks don't do near females," he
told Tanzan, "especially not young and lovely ones. It
is dangerous. Why did you do that?"

"I left the girl there," said Tanzan. "Are you still
carrying her?"  

I Lost my father when I was 14. It was very sudden.  He died of a
brain hemorrhage when he was 42. We were in Miami at the time
and he and my mother were looking for a place to buy so as to
move there from North East Ohio.

I had had a very bad fight with him the night before, The first real
fight I had ever had with my father.  I was left at the motel we were
staying at to look after my younger brothers and sisters. 

My parents were expected back before lunch but lunch time came
and went and they had not shown up. I was concerned and also a
bit angry for them to be so late.

Somewhere around 3 in the afternoon a Coral Gables policeman
arrived and told us the my father had had a stroke.  It was as if
all the air and energy I had suddenly left.  I knew this was very,
very bad. I tried to comfort my younger siblings and told them it
may not be so bad. Snuck out side and cried my eyes out for a
few minutes. Went back inside as if nothing had happened.

My mother did not show up until around 7 that evening. She said
our father was dead.  She put her head on my shoulder and cried.
Then we all walked to a the nearest phone both and she called her
father, my grandfather and told him. She told us that he was coming down
to take us up to his place in outside of Phillie. You see my mother
did not drive.

We stayed there at my grandfathers for the next 6 months while my
mother learned to drive and got all the legal items take care of.
Selling the house in Ohio, getting our items which were in storage
transferred to my grandparents place. Etc.

We eventually moved back down to Florida..Naples on the west coast.
A year or so after we moved there the subject came up as to whether
or not my mother would ever remarry. She said absolutely not. I gave
a non committal answer of Ok or some such. But in my mind I was
saying (YES !).

You see my relationship with my father had soured considerably over
the last year and a half or so before his death. The mild mannered yet
sometimes distant man I had known began to change. He became
easily angered. Would contradict himself. Rageful.  He had become
like Dr. Jekyll and Mister Hyde. With more and more of the Hyde.

One minute nice and caring the next angry and mean.

My mother had known something was wrong but not what as he did not
tell her much. Just that he was sick and she passed it off. She did not
WANT to know.

I did not find out until many years later just how sick he was. After talking
at length with my cousin, his niece. You see he did know exactly what was
wrong and had told his mother. He had some very intense tests done but
never told anyone else about it.

Meanwhile I had a lot anger, loss, guilt and fear surround that part. A lot
of baggage to carry. To the point of having nightmares.

It was not until is was in my 40s that I finally was able come to deal with
that whole period in my life. And it took 8 years of group therapy and
counseling.

I came to be able to let go of that part of my life. But I cannot say that it
has not effected me. Because it has. 

I still have problems with relationships with members of my own gender.
And there are still buttons that can be pushed. But not nearly as many
as before.

Letting go is not easy. Especially when one has to let go of a ghost.

C