Here I go again... I have to tell my story, as far as I know it, for my own sake as much as anyone else's. I posted that I'd write about my father next, because I knew wouldn't do it if I didn't give my word. I'm embarassed writing about it. I know that many people here have had worse family histories than mine-- probably most of you have. It feels wrong to complain, but I have to write about my family. For reasons I don't quite know, I have to start with my father. And to write about my father, I have to start with Myth.

Every culture I know of has Myths about Wrath. Someone breaks a fundamental Law; some great injustice is done... and the Deity is angry. The deity desires revenge. In the Enuma Elish, Tiamat wages war in Heaven. In Greek myth, Zeus hurls his lightning bolt. In Exodous, Yahweh smites Egypt. I know many people aren't comfortable with this. How can a Deity-- a life-giver, One so far removed from human failings, feel anything as negative as Wrath?
I think people who can't undersand Wrath must never have suffered at the hands of another. Any god or human being who is truly good should have the capacity for Wrath, because there is no other appropriate reaction to grave injustice. Repressed Wrath is not a virtue-- it is a serious vice.
But Wrath in itself is not always good. This goes without saying. Wrath about situations that are not unjust is misguided. Human beings who pour their Wrath out on the innocent are gravely wrong.
My father is a man of misplaced Wrath.

I feel guilty just for writing this. I feel that I have to qualify it somehow. My conditioning is telling me that I should be grateful to have grown up with a father at all, when so many people haven't.
My conditioning is poison. I know that by now.

I love my father. This would be so much easier if I hated him, but I don't. I should qualify, at least a little; I owe him that much. I have so many good memories of him. He read to me every night, said my prayers, drove me to school... the things a good father should do.
But my father's misplaced Wrath drove me away.
I'm sorry. I will continue; I'll explain somehow. I can't leave the story unfinished. But I've run out of words. I have to stop for now.