::08:15:09::

::: The Man Behind The Iron Mask :::

By ~ Rolando Rosario

Last night I had a dream of a world where my daughter hated me. She despised me with such a grudge that it could not help but remind me of her mother. A bitter chill relished in her eyes, as her words stabbed like daggers through my heart. I was never a great farther. I was never the man that kept a family shrine around his desk at work, or scheduled family events for every weekend. I was never the type of person to run around with a wallet full of pictures screaming to the world “ Look at my baby!!!!”. Of course I carry pictures of my daughter, I use to carry pictures of her mother too before the divorce. But I was always the type of person to pull them out on request not advertise them to the world. My reason for this may not make any sense to some. But I cherished my family. They were irreplaceable to me, worth more than gold or money. Some what of a vulnerability as I use to put it. I always thought that I would die without them. For my heart only beat for them. The endless hours of work. The placing of my dreams and desires on the back burner. The constant bitching and bickering, tears and regrets. I never regretted anything myself but I can not speak for all parties involved.

After all that,  I sit here still shadowed. I willingly release 37 percent of my check. that’s more than double the legal child support percentage at 17 percent. I eat once a day, don’t have a penny to my name after I am done paying the bills I acquired will still married, but some how I turned out to be the bad guy.

My weeks are hectic with work and pursuing something that I know will be achieved, but sometimes I wonder could it had been achieved already if I had not placed it aside. I look at my daughter sometimes. Not in person, but from a picture and wonder if she will understand when she gets older. Will she remember all the times when I tried to come pick her up and her mother slammed the door in my face. The times we did spend together the two of us, just me and her, farther and daughter enjoying the day the good lord gave to us. I am only human, I cannot see the future, or predict life’s out comes. I can not force myself in one direction, when my heart tells me to go another. I gave a lot of myself away to a person, who at the time deserved it. But soon enough abused it, and forgot how special it was.

My dream may have been an awakening, a warning, or maybe just a fear. A thought that someone who I love unconditionally could just through me away.  Be infected and influenced by another, who in my absence fed her hatred and lies. My daughter is truly the only person I can rely on in this world. Her smile shows me heaven, in a world I knew as only hell. A insight that at one time we were all innocent. Just little beings, learning and becoming influenced by our surroundings. Not yet knowing dreams or desires. Just basic wants and needs. I wish that I could remember a time with such innocence and when I realize I cannot, it does not matter. I have the chance to relive it with her.