When I was a kid, still trying to figure out what the world was all about, I used to hear my friends talk about their fathers as if they were superheroes. Because we had little interaction, I never got to know much about my father. This is perplexing because youngsters grow up accustomed to the embrace and comfort of father figures whom the Almighty may have allowed them to have in their life. Yet, I assumed I was unlucky since my father was forced into the army, which meant he had to spend much of his time there trying to keep the country safe “All throughout the war father was in the army.”
On the onset, my mother made me understand the fact that being in the army was very demanding and the people who were lucky to be members had to devote themselves to ensure that they served s they had sworn their lives they would. Just to recall vividly, the only time I saw most of my father was during the morning when I would wake up and find him standing by my bedside starring down at me on the bed. It gave me the awkward feeling and illusion that he was a David and I was a Goliath. This is attributed to the fact that he was huge and muscular not forgetting that he was tall. When I laid sight on him from the point I was lying in bed; it made him appear even taller than he had been in real sense and hilarious too because of the khaki pants he used to fancy.
Often, I acted as though what my fellow children said did not pose any influence on me. Sincerely speaking it made me feel as if I had been born during the wrong error thus feeling like an outcast in their midst. They used to discuss how they would feel terrified in their rooms and decide to sandwich themselves in the midst of their parents in bed which as compared to my situation was rather uncomfortable “I woke up only to see a big figure in khaki peering down at me.” This was attributed to the squeeze that I got when I decided to push myself to fit in between them just because I could not withstand the scary nature of my bedroom most of the nights more so the ones that were accompanied with rain.
There are things about my father serving in the army that made me feel happy and erased the somber mood that envisaged my face when they brought the topic up; my father always left a souvenir every time he came home and left it in the drawer. None of the other students ever had the laxity of seeing any of them let alone touching them. This is the issue that gave me consolation coupled with the fact that my father was doing all he could to ensure that he was keeping everyone safe including the parents of the children I felt unsafe around. They were inclusive of Gurkha knives, German helmets, button sticks and model tanks.
Other than work, there was one thing that my father really adored as it seemed to make him feel pleasant and presentably jovial before anyone; he enjoyed smoking “The smoke gave him a pleasant musty smell.” The musty smell of the smoke that flew from the rolls he used to smoke from, made him develop an astounding interest. The only magpie that I learned about my father was that he thought of everything to be significant inclusive of the souvenir that he kept claiming would come in handy at one point in life yet my other did not share his perception of the same. This is just because he would always let me go through every time he turned his back to either leave the house for personal reasons or get to work.
My life was never simple. It was always accompanied with the routine roles that I had to play each day. The first thing that would take place between my parents was that they would wake up in the morning and start discussing the things that my mother and I would be doing during the better part of the day. However, there were topics that my mother and I could never seem to agree about; the issue regarding a new baby. Notably, ours was the only house in the area we stayed that did not have a little one because every time I started the topic my mother always dashed it away with the claim that we could not afford one till father found his way back home. I only seemed to be happy in the house during the days that my father was away for war as I knew that my mother had no reason to be anxious whatsoever “He began to talk gravely to mother, who looked quite anxious at that time,” The only time I was really peaceful was during the war.” Every time my father came back from the war, my mother seemed happy, but then the mood would change when they began conversing.
