Dear Papa

Dear Papa,

I’ve never really addressed you directly, I’ve always been a bit scared. You’re a rather intimidating man, you know. Apart from your physical bulk (which is considerable, and has grown so much since you married Mum that I fear for your health), your very manner suggests an air of superiority and, in some cases, utter contempt for any people that you seem to think are beneath you. This is odd, because you consistently attempt to talk down to people. Of course, the issue really is that in talking down, you make it clear that you’re talking down. I am uncomfortably suspicious that your use of the vernacular is an attempt to curry favour with those who you deem to be too unintelligent to understand you otherwise. It’s a pity you never truly embraced the education of your stepchildren in such a way as to make them genuinely aware that some of your rhetoric is utter bullshit. Like all the other stepfathers we’ve had to endure over the years, you seem to prefer to keep us malleable through flattery, bribery and a sort of education that relies heavily on propaganda.

I hate to sound so condescending, Papa, but I’m truly at the end of my tether. You know, when you first came into my life I was really optimistic that you’d always do what is best for me and my siblings. I remember the night you married Mum so clearly: the fête was amazing! All the family was drinking and dancing like there was no tomorrow. We were all so pleased that you’d finally managed to convince Mum to marry you. Yes, I know there were a few people around who were wary, but we totally ignored them because our previous stepfather had been such a rascally spider.

Now, several years into the future, you’re almost worse than that old spider. I don’t doubt that you have some love for us, eh. I mean, I think that when you married Mum you did it because you love her, and by extension us. But somewhere along the way you decided that to show your love would be to do stuff for us that YOU think is good for us, not that we really need. All these elaborate gifts you’ve been showering us with are truly wonderful, but do we really need them? I mean, just last week one of my sisters was ill and you decided to buy her a toy plane rather than the medication she needed. It’s not your love for us that I’m doubting, it’s the way you seem to show it. We’ll love you for giving us what we need, not what we want. And we’ll love you even more if you give us things that make us better people, rather than wealthier people. Do you know what I mean?

You know, I’d like to thank you for my education, but I can’t. The truth is, it is Stepdad Spider who sent me to university. When I did my postgraduate work I didn’t even bother to ask you to help out, even though by then you and Mum were married. I just didn’t feel comfortable doing it because, though the honeymoon wasn’t over yet, I’d already seen the seeds of something suspicious. Now I’m considering going off to do more studying, and I really don’t want to ask you for any financial help. I feel that if I do, you’ll ask me to be a loyal stepson in ways that go against my own beliefs. It’s like you demand so much of us, and you make us feel like these demands are only natural; like our personal development should be sacrificed on the altar of family commitment. Is that really fair?

Please understand, Papa, I don’t hate you. You’re a man like any other, and you have a particularly difficult burden to carry since Stepdad Spider left Mum in really dire straits. I just think you shouldered this burden too ambitiously, and possibly a little disingenuously. You told us so many things that I now know were merely chat; just you speaking for the sake of sounding good. You do that a lot you know. You talk and talk and talk, and say nothing substantial. And I can see that you have (or maybe had?) the desire to do good by us, your stepchildren, but you promise things that you can’t really deliver; or you promise things that you deliver in a half-assed, barely successful manner. And let’s not forget that when you give us things, you make us feel like we owe you, personally, for them. Sometimes I wonder if you’ve forgotten that by marrying Mum you are duty bound to take care of us. We don’t owe you anything, Papa; yet you owe us everything. Isn’t that what parenthood means?

Anyway, I seem to be rambling on in this letter. I just want you to know that, although your relationship with Mum is souring, I do think you tried to do what you think is best for us in the beginning. You have been misguided, and you have let certain negative aspects of your personality dictate behaviours that were destructive, not only to yourself, but to your marriage and the lives of your children as well. I don’t think you did this maliciously, but I do think you lost sight of your true duties as husband and stepfather. If Mum does decide to end it with you, please don’t blame either her or us. We all gave you a chance. It’s not our fault that you changed and became selfishly involved in looking good to other families.

I hope the weather remains fine.

Yours sincerely,

Will