It’s been ten years since you’ve been gone, and it feels like forever. Where’d you go? Why’d you leave? How could you just walk out and leave us? I miss you Dad, I just want you to know that.

I don’t understand, and I never have. For the last 10 years I’ve been waiting. I’ve been waiting, I’ve been wishing, I’ve been hoping you will come back. It’s not like I never see you, but once or twice a year just isn’t enough and it never will be.

Every time we talk I want to tell you I’ve had it. I want to tell you that I hate you for what you’ve done. But I can never find the words, because I don’t want to be without you completely. You mean too much to me, after all, I'm only the person I am because of you.

They say “what doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger”, and if that’s true than I am Hercules. Yeah, it hurts. It hurts like hell, actually. I wish I had the normal family, just for a while at least. Mum, Dad, brother, sister. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. It’s not supposed to be the screwed up way I have it.

All I wanted was for you to come back home. Its bad enough you left, but why did you have to move away? You grew up here; this place should be your home. Now it’s not your home any more. It’s just the place you used to live.

We had some good times. Parties, get-togethers, barbeques every few weekends. Now I barely even see you. To be honest, I try not to think about it, because when I think about it I want to cry, and I hate that.

But I'm fine, I really am, and it’s going to stay that way. If you decide you have something to say, well I'm right where I’ve always been.

It’s fucked up, but its not going to change. I'm sick of waiting. Sick of wishing, sing of hoping. Sick of making excuses, and sick of feeling this way. All I want is for you to still be here, like when I was little.

They also say “you don’t know what you got until it’s gone” and I understand that fully now. I had it good when I was little and I didn’t even know it. Now I'm grown, and I wish I still had it. I miss it.

You know what? Fuck you. It’s been ten years of waiting, and I don’t want to any more. If you decide you want to come back, if you decide you want to be a father again, it’s too late. I won’t be here, and you can be the one who sits and waits, hoping for me to come back.

I don’t know if you ever really cared. Maybe you used to, a long time ago, way back when. But now… I don’t even know any more.

I don’t want to care about you. I wish I could hate you, but the truth is I can’t, because in spite of everything I do still love you. I just don’t want to.

It would be so much easier to hate you, Dad. I hate that you left. I hate that you hurt me. I hate that you walked away, and you never seemed to care about me. I hate you, because I still love you.

The bible says “Thou must love thy parents” but it says nothing about having to like them.