Happy Father's Day in Prison?

 "Happy Father's Day!" a prisoner greets me in the hallway early Sunday morning. "Happy Father's Day," I respond. We're simply exchanging pleasantries, acknowledging each other's status as fathers, but I can't help but feel the irony. 

We're both, like many other prisoners, fathers in the sense that we have fathered children, but here we are in prison away from our children. Some prisoners are still active in their children's lives, even from prison, but even they are physically absent, unable to fulfill even the most basic aspects of fatherhood. The rest of us, well, we're simply absent, dead-beat dads (so to speak). We're dead-beats primarily because of our choices that led us to prison, away from our children, even if some of us desperately long to have our children in our lives, even long distance. Still, what sort of fathering can one do from within prison? 

While being a father was my greatest joy in life, I hardly feel worthy of the title now. A day celebrating fathers is not a joyous occasion for me. It's hardly "happy." Instead, it reminds me, every year, of my biggest failures, my deepest regrets. Yes, I have beautiful memories to hold onto, and I treasure those every day. But, those memories are tainted with mourning how I've so profoundly failed my children. I can only hope and pray that they have good memories to hold onto, even if shadowed by grief or anger. 

Though my own father has been gone now for just over a year, I know well the strange duplicity of memories. Every good memory of him is filled with a longing that can never be fulfilled, and with a sorrow that hasn't begun to heal. It breaks my heart to think that I have continued the cycle of painful memories when it comes to fathers in my family. I would change that if I could. 

In the mean time, I smile a smile that hides my pain and respond with kindness to another hurting father, "Happy Father's Day," knowing full well that for neither of us will this day be happy.