Email from the father figure this morning informs me that he won’t read dogpoet anymore. Going from knowing very little about me to knowing “too much” was a tad difficult for him, I take it.

Giving him the benefit of the doubt, that his curiosity won’t get the better of him again someday, why do I still feel kinda…yucky?

Could it be that I know he read the entire campfire, all ten months of archives included? (thanks for that questionable gift, Sitemeter)

Yeah, because now he knows more. More than I do about him. Much, much more. And I mean the real, interior stuff, not the daily minutiae. I asked for it, putting it up on the Internet, but it doesn’t mean I’m comfortable with the consequences.

The Tattooed Monk called last night as I sat in a funk; resistant to all expressions of friendly “help”, “support”, etc. After awhile he got me talking. Here in my hand I have my dad’s apologies and a request to move forward, but I resist. It became clear to me after enough poking and prodding that my identity is heavily invested with the energy it took to become independent of my father. A ten-year old boy decided that if his father couldn’t “be there”, then the father couldn’t have him: not the real him, not the inside him. Twenty-one years of independence have had their effect. He’s asking me now to relinquish that identity, to give myself to him. Oh lord, I’m resistant. Maybe I can just give him Secret Agent Fuzzy Kitten.