An Appreciation
“We should ask Amina,” my father says, “since I think she’s slept with more women than either of us.”
He laughs, his friend laughs … and I’m more than a little mortified. But I’m mortified in a good way, I suppose. We’re sitting in the house of a friend of my father’s from multiple decades. He’s also a ‘returnee’; went to the US as a young man for education and stayed until he finally retired years later. Right now, we’re staying in this house and they’ve been conversing about how they weighed the relative merits of marrying an American or a woman from ‘back home’ when they were both much younger … and they’re looking to me as an expert, not because I’m a bit of both, but because their assumption is I’ve had more direct experience in the beds of both.
And of course it’s mortifying … just as the past few months when my father has essentially learned my entire unexpurgated sex-life. (Though I guess it pleases me to know that I have slept around more than he ever did; I’ve always been aware of the intense bond between my parents – and getting indirect confirmation of that feels good)
I’m awkward of course in answering the particular question … but that it’s even asked is a wonderful thing!
This, I suspect, is how Arab men (well, men period) talk when the women aren’t around. And they’re treating me like one of them. Two old Arab men chatting about girls with a younger one. Who happens to be a girl.
It’s part of what this whole adventure these past weeks has been like for me. My dad and I have always been close; I was a bit of a tom-boy as a child and was more interested in helping my father than my mother. Sometimes, looking back, I think he treated me more like a son than a daughter, sometimes more even than my brother.
Our other sisters did ‘girlie’ things; my brother and I went places with my father. I recall Mother’s Days back in the Shenandoah Valley where Amr and I insisted on dad taking us to watch the Civil War reinactment up at New Market or going to the Smithsonian and wanting to see skeletons and rockets, not dresses … but please don’t misunderstand; I never ever wanted to be a male! I’m a girl, thank you very much, and never had any doubts of that, even if I never particularly acted like a ‘stereotypical’ anything.
But anyhow, these past weeks have been a time when we, my father and I, have gotten much closer. Some of that has been of necessity; traveling around this great country of ours and living cheek to jowl, watching out for each other and so many other things. I’ve cut and dyed his hair, dressed him and found spaces for him; he’s done the same for me. We’ve been living in each other’s life, which has meant also knowing each other better than we ever have as adults. I need to tell him that so-and-so and I dated; he needs to tell me that such-and-such’s sister was his fiancee (I didn’t even know he was ever engaged before my mother until then).
And the white-haired Muslim patriarch and his queer daughter go place to place; we’ve pretended to be husband and wife, patient and nurse … I’ve woken up on a bus draped over him.
And just like when all this began, one thing is certain to me in a world that keeps turning upside down: my father’s unconditional love. He’s never once told me that I’m wrong or wicked or evil for desiring women, not now, not ever. His only concern was that I might be hurt. He’s never been anything but understanding … and never once tried to mke me into something I am not. He has told me when I asked him why he never was that, even had he wanted to, I always was far harsher on myself than anyone else could ever be.
And I’ve joked that, when this is all over, I’m going to nominate him for P-FLAG’s man of the year (if they have such a thing). After all, family, as he says, should always be first.
4 comments:
A salute to Abu Amina as only an Arab man can say and as only this fine gentleman could understand. Allah yehfazkom both.
Great good thanks for such a wonderful father. My Syrian mother accepts me as a woman who loves women also :)
you father is a wonderful man... and we are glad to hear that you are both safe.. we started getting worried when you did not post for a few days.
That's beautiful to read. This is how it should be; unconditional love between father and daughter. Well done guys!!
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