“If my mother's soul had already vacated her body, I am certain now that it had not yet left the room. I didn’t believe in souls and spirits in those days, but in revisiting that scene as I write this, I know that the limp hand I held was somehow also holding mine…”

Few of the stories I share about my father in my memoir are flattering. Not only was he physically and emotionally absent, he wasn’t even my natural father. Yet I carry his name, and of my three fathers, he is the only one I ever think of as "Daddy." So on this 56th anniversary of his death, I share this tale of love and reconciliation…. 

March 26, 1984: With my mother gone, all her hopes, fears and expectations for me were gone too. Suddenly, without being conscious of it or of what it meant, I was free.