[Evans, Marv]

My father died in 1992 at an age five years younger than I am now. Although my parents stayed together to the end, our family life as kids was emotionally pretty barren and mostly filled with negative input. As I looked back as an adult, I realized pretty much both of them - especially my father was just waiting it out until we left the nest. In addition, he had other issues. I felt a lot of anger until my late thirties, when I just had to tell myself we couldn't choose our relatives and people are the people they are even if they are your parents. That released some of the angst to the point I got along better with my feelings. So you can live your life with a father who is physically not there or physically there but not in other ways. I think it's the luck of the draw and have to move on at some point - you know love yourself. I always considered other kids lucky to have parents who treated them as persons even when I was a kid and noticed the difference. We just don't all hit the jackpot. Don't get me started on the subject of getting older personally.