Maybe Is a Nothing Word

A Letter To My Father

I had been sober a few years and living in Ohio when I got the call the that you were in the hospital, the result of a drunken night and a brawl in a bar. Or outside the bar. Or who cares where it was, really.

I flew home in time to get to you before checkout. You told me that some assholes were picking on some young gay kid, and you intervened. For your efforts, you got jumped.

Honestly, dad, I was not used to seeing you on the receiving end of a beatdown. My entire life was filled with you doling it out to bigger, seemingly stronger dudes. Here you were in a hospital bed broken by other men.

Once grandma’s fear subsided it gave way to that passionate Latina anger. She. Was. Pissed. At the assholes who did this to her son, sure. But mostly, she was angry at you.

So you checked yourself into outpatient rehab and told me to go back to Ohio - you had this. I said no. I said I would stay as long as it took for you to get your feet under you again. I went with you to a few meetings, saw you putting in the work and, after a couple of weeks I started looking at plane tickets.

You told me my sobriety inspired you. That my example was enough for you to stay on the path of sobriety. I thought that was enough.

This is where my regret begins.

I should have stayed. I should have moved back home right then and there. I should have walked through your sobriety with you. If I had done that, you would still be here.

But we all know how the movie ended. I didn’t move back to California like a dutiful son. I went back to my life in Ohio. I stayed in almost constant contact with you and with grandma — just to make sure I was getting the unvarnished truth. And I went on with my life.

I didn’t stay sober. The how and why of my drinking again is unimportant for this letter. All that matters is that I was drinking again. I was drinking when you came out to visit me. I was drinking when you fell in love with my little piece of the midwest. I was drinking when I decided — and made a grand gesture of telling you — that I was going to buy a house big enough for you to come live with me once you retired.

I wanted to repay you for all you did for me. It became something of an obsession for me. To the point where I put down money on a place on a lake the next county over.

Then I got that call.

And I got very, very drunk very, very often in the days leading up to your funeral. I behaved in ways that I am so glad you weren’t alive to see, honestly.

We buried you. I went back to Ohio. I kept drinking. I promised I would quit, but that was a lie. When I was sober I was miserable. I would catch myself thinking about all of the what-ifs. When I drank I was miserable until I was numb. Then I was a monster.

I eventually got sober again. The how and why aren’t really pertinent to this letter. What is important is that getting sober meant dealing with my own guilt, my own regret.

Once I started drinking again, it gave you permission to begin drinking again. At least, that was what the voice in my head had convinced me of. The monologue in my head went something like this:

If you’d just moved back to California to be with your dad when he was getting sober, he might still be here. You could have walked him through his sobriety and, in the process, kept your own. Failing that, you could have simply NOT started drinking again. You were a beacon to your father; an example of sober living. But no, you had to be a selfish prick, and this is the natural end result. It’s as much on you as it is on your dad. You could have saved him. You piece of shit.

Dad, I don’t tell you this to make you feel bad. I tell you this because I need you to see that this is not where my story ends. The guilt, the self-abhorrence, the overwhelming desire to drink again - none of that beat me.

Yeah, maybe if I had moved back to California when you first tried getting sober - MAYBE you would still be here. Maybe if I had never started drinking again you would have held onto my example, or at least you would have called me before ever picking up again yourself. And MAYBE you would still be here.

But maybe is a nothing word; it’s a way to pretend a world into existence that is never going to be real.

What is real is that you drank again. And you died as a result. No maybe can change any of that.

I am sober.

Maybe there were any number of times along the way I should have died. Maybe.

But I didn’t.

I wish I had never picked up again. I wish I had moved back to California to be with you while you got sober. I wish you were still here and you could visit us in Paris and you could fall in love with my wife and my city.

And maybe, in some parallel universe, that is exactly what happens.

Maybe.

I took this photo, then used ComfyUI (locally hosted so don’t come for me) to create a cool image.