“Mommy why is daddy running into the walls?”  This sentence was all too familiar living with my dad when I was younger.  As a six year-old you’re completely oblivious to the way that adults act.  All you see is a behavior but you don’t really understand why this behavior is happening.  As a six year-old you do not understand that the normal father behaviors are not passed out on the couch, running into walls, or clueless to everything around them. 
         The drive to grandma and grandpas house was never a good one at 1am. These trips were always because of my alcoholic dad scaring us out of the house. My mom was only trying to protect us and do the best she could not to let us see the horrific effects alcohol has on a person.  We'd get to grandma and grandpas house after a long 25-minute ride of silence. Even silent you could hear my moms cries. The expression on her face, the way she said, "it's going to be okay.", let you know something wasn't right.  How could someone she knew and loved so much fall victim to such a consuming and heartbreaking disease?  When we arrive to my grandparents they let us in not saying a word. The jolly and kind face of a grandma was replaced with the face of sadness as she strokes my thin, short,bleach blonde hair.  Being little kids my brother and I quickly ignore the sadness and the situation around us as we laugh and play on their fascinating pinball machines in the large finished basement. We were so oblivious to the sadness and pain going on upstairs.  In some way it's comforting to think that our six year-old little brains don't allow us to recognize all of these emotions or events because if we did our childhood would not be filled with laughs and creativity and games and carefree play. Instead,they would be filled with confusion, shame, or hurt.
          Those weird and long nights happened over the course of my parent’s marriage. As I grew older, I began to realize that this wasn't the way things were supposed to be. Many nights were spent trying to go to sleep trying to tune out the loud yells through the wall of my parent’s room. "Problems with bills hunny go to bed," they would say. And I would slowly go into my room dragging my feet in my colorful polka dot pajamas carrying my favorite purple teddy bear. During the day they would lock the door ,more arguing, I would slip notes under the door. When are you guys going to come out?, What are you talking about?  The fourth grade was when my mom decided she had had enough. They filed for divorce and that was the end of our not so perfect family of four. My dad moved to Ohio. No one really understands or knows why he made this decision. When you look at my father you see a successful business man in a suit.  Never had a probably getting a job, never had a problem selling his company's product to big corporations or talking to you about history or anything about computers. But he failed at one thing and that was being a father in my childhood.  A couple long court-filled years after the divorce, my dad finally hit a breaking point and got sober, went to rehab got himself together trying to make up the lost years he had with us. You knew he cared the way he tried to come to Michigan as often as possible to take us to the movies or some fun "bonding" activity.  He got married and divorced again, but not for the same reason with my mom, they simply weren't right for each other.  His days were spent on Match eventually finding his "perfect match" who he is now engaged to.