This is not meant as a pity thing. This past year, I've had to face losing the three men who have had the most impact on my life growing up.

First was my uncle, who I hung out with every day after school when I was a kid. Then my grandfather, who together with my grandmother raised me as his own daughter. (This is the most excruciating loss, and that is all I can say on the subject.)

Now it's my estranged father - who I've not seen for twenty years.

I've usually told people who ask that I can't remember my father's face, or much else about him. I'm writing this to apologize for having said that, because that was a lie. In fact, I remember his face very well.

My clearest memory of his face, in fact, is from a forced visitation weekend when I was five - and it's from a vantage point above him, looking down the length of his arm as I'm dangling from his hand, which is holding me above his head by my neck. He had lost his temper and was shouting and choking me, because he had told me to do something and I had done it wrong. That was the only time in my memory that I can recall losing control of my bodily functions due to outright terror. I was too scared even to struggle to breathe.

The second clearest memory of him is when he is shouting and hitting the walls and ceiling inside the car and swearing at his three-year-old son for spilling a Coke.

When I was twelve, lawyers advised my mom that the courts would finally allow her to stop forcing me to go visit him. This was a relief to both of us.

Over the years, my father would try to track me down. Sometimes he would succeed, other times not. I kept my phone # unlisted.

Two weeks ago, he tracked me down and found me on tribe.

He told me he was dying.

I'd always assumed that this would happen later on in my life. Fifty-six is a young age at which to die, after all. And that, when it did, I'd hear about it afterward. And that I wouldn't care.

And maybe I shouldn't. But now that I'm faced with it, the idea of him dying alone, with only his sixteen-year-old son who I've never met looking after him doesn't sit so well with me - even after the experiences of the forced visitation weekends. This is a conflicting thing. And it's coming at the worst time possible. Having experienced my grandfather's passing, which was eased by everyone in the family, could maybe help this be easier to deal with. But it's coming when I'm currently investing all my resources to help put together a huge event. I can't go see him, can't do anything about this, don't know if he's passed already. And I can't get away to find out. He hasn't sent anything else, and didn't leave his phone #. I don't know where he lives.

So this is taking a toll, on top of having lost my grandfather.

I'm writing this to apologize. For the lie of not remembering my biological father, but for something else as well. It's been hard to concentrate on anything else, and my nerves have been shot more than once these past two weeks. I've snapped at people who didn't deserve it, can't seem to follow organizational threads and discussions, and . I've been so distracted that last night, thinking about this while driving home to Valencia from Canoga Park, I made it all the way down the 405 to the 10 interchange before realizing that I'd gone the wrong way and had to turn back. Anyone who has felt let down, ignored, snapped at, or otherwise upset by me these past two weeks: I can only offer my reassurances that it wasn't personal, no harm was meant, I'll try harder to follow the conversation next time, and that any seeming reaction to whatever's going on is probably not to the situation you think it is. I usually don't like to broadcast personal shit, and even writing this makes me feel like I'm whining and making too much of an explanation for acting and thinking in ways that irritate and confuse me too...like in a "Why couldn't I have seen that **that** was what they were talking about?" kind of way.

In closing, this is not meant to excuse any of my words and actions, confusion and irritation, distraction and withdrawal which may have confused or upset anyone. It is not meant to engender pity. It is not a plea for advice on what to do. I'm flying blind right now, but it's meant as an honest and sincere apology and reassurance, so if anything in this communication sounds clear, let it be that.

Sincerely,

Anna Maltese