comphet

I don’t talk a lot about my adoptive dad, but I actively miss him every day. He felt extremely left out of the weird relationship my adoptive mom and I had, which baffled me as a kid. What he was actually observing was our enmeshment, and I guess he thought he wanted in on that. That’d made me sad. Really, I’d had an incredibly normal and healthy relationship with my adoptive dad—just terse. Maybe he wished I’d asked him more questions. He never pushed me to overshare. I guess I didn’t want to be pushy, either. His favorite poet was William Blake. He was always very lonely. I don’t discuss him very often, except for when I’m describing dementia caregiving or, less frequently, the KKK’s actions toward Catholic immigrants in Philadelphia during the Great Depression. I once asked my adoptive mom about Paul’s letters to the Corinthians. I was especially interested in men being the heads of households: Women, submit to your husbands as they submit to God. Yep, she said. “Well, then what’s…