Well got some news today......Joseph William Tessinari died .......he was my father and a man that I have to say in the many years since the divorce from my mom didn't have contact with his children. He died in NM and will be cremated there after a short Buddhist ceremony. I have my memories of him and fond ones, since I did live with him for a couple of years during my high school years in Monrovia, California. I will miss that we weren't close but he was my father. So dad wherever you are know that you had a daughter that will keep those memories in her head. AND I LOVE YOU KNOW MATTER WHAT.
@everyone thank you for your kind words and sympathy.....i am still numb walking around thinking about things and how they could have, should have, or was and I am sad for a dad that wasn't there but he was my dad and I hope he is at peace now and looking down upon his children and seeing what we have become and what he missed....if there is a movie projector in heaven playing his children's lives may he be sitting there with popcorn and watching and smiling upon us. It's a sad thing in life to die and your children just go about their day because it's just another day to them....they may have the feelings that come pouring out, but we have the look like "why" still for a dad that should have always been there.....I was the only child who ever got that yearly Christmas card and when I don't get one this year I will probably hurt knowing that at least that was once a year my name came up.....LOVE YOU DAD ALWAYS HAVE. So many things left unsaid and unfinished....DON'T ALLOW THAT TO HAPPEN TO ANY OF YOU.....love and be loved back...
***this post still isn't completed to me. I am getting so many messages from all that read this but I still have thoughts I need to put down as you all know me very well. It's just right now the thoughts and the feelings are overwhelming me and I need to just allow my feelings to get in the order that needs to be said.
Wrote this on August 30, 2014
My eulogy to
Joseph William Tessinari. A man that was
a mystery to his children. Someone who was
there and then gone. I had memories,
lots of them, good and bad. The only
father that I have known. The only
father that I have an image of. Who
cares if your DNA didn’t run through me?
You were the one to take me out of Vietnam. You were the one I called “Daddy”. You were the one that had a daughter out here
that wanted the title “Daddy’s Little Girl”.
I have to allow myself to say that you did love us. Or you did love me because I got the
Christmas card every year. Or you only remembered
me and my name because you got one from me every year. A girl always needs her daddy. No matter how old they get, I always needed
my daddy. And now you aren’t on this
earth anymore.
Tears haven’t
flowed yet. They begin to and then as
fast as they try to, the tears dry up just as fast. All those questions not answered. All the “I love you” not said. How does that happen? Why does that happen to children and their
daddy? My own “daddy” couldn’t be a
daddy. Did you ever think about us while
you had a quiet moment? Did you remember
one child was named after your own father and the other child was named after
you? Did you remember your flesh and
blood daughter passed? Did you remember
the one daughter still here, the pictures I sent, or the letters pouring out my
heart practically begging you to say something fatherly to me?
Did you want
to take a wife and a girl out of Vietnam?
Or was it true that you were reprimanded by your own parents because
everyone thought I was flesh and blood.
But even if I wasn’t the other three were. I LOVED YOU DADDY. I wanted to know you, I wanted you in my
life. Divorce didn’t have to be the
end. Your new family should have been an
extension not an ending. Did you know
the names of your grandchildren or the great children?
I remember
the worst. I do, but I also remember the
best. I remember that old boat that
grandpa and yourself worked on. I remember
how you looked. I remember the daddy
bigger than life. I remember the
motorcycle you came into town to visit us kids at one point. I remember you allowing a young teenage girl to
find some footing when I was having a time in Florida. I remember being in California when you were
dating Kathy. I remember you catching me
taking your car for a joy ride. I
remember you sticking up for me when I got a jay walking ticket. I remember you almost caught me with a boy in
the house, or you knew but ignored it and gave me time to get him out. I remember the beatings too. I remember you never stopping mom from
beating me. I remember the soap in my
mouth because I was teaching Joe a bad word.
I remember running away and you coming to get me from the police
station. I remember the big piece of
wood that I got a beating from you with.
I don’t remember the hugs or the
happiness though. I remember looking at
you and wondering why I didn’t get many hugs or kisses. I remember me having to watch you from the
stairs in the townhouse in NJ wanting you to say, “How is my little girl?” Why is it that some memories are vivid and
not all of them are vivid? I want it all
the good and the bad to be clearer than they are. I want to have a daddy still here to knock on
my door and say, “I am sorry”.
I feel so
lonely right now writing this. I feel
empty and yet I find the tears are running right now freely and honestly of sadness. I know this is a process that a daughter has
to go through after hearing her daddy is gone and the questions will never be
answered in her mind or heart. I know
writing this and putting it out there is the rawest and the most honest
feelings I am having about this at this moment.
But is there more? Is there more
that is going to come to my mind and heart.
I have a
daddy now that is at peace. But you
leave a daughter that may never be at peace.
It was always there the questions but I didn’t have the daddy to answer
them for me. You are the daddy I knew,
you are the daddy that I loved. You are
the only daddy I had. And you are
gone. Just like that a phone call comes
and says, “Your daddy passed”. I knew it
would come, I knew that the tears would come.
But I didn’t want it to, no little girl wants it to. At the age of 46 I didn’t want it to. I LOVE YOU DADDY. I love you more then you will ever know. No matter if it’s the bad memories or the
good ones I LOVED YOU DADDY.
May god forgive
you as I am forgiving you at this moment.
I forgive you as a daughter should always forgive a parent. May all little girls not have to go through
this and I know in my heart I am not alone, it just feels like it. But as far as I am concerned you are the
daddy I was meant to have and love and may you know that in death as you should
have known that in life.
Love your daughter,
MyLinh Tessinari McDonald
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