SAVING MR. BANKS

I was watching the movie, starring Emma Thompson and Tom Hanks. It was quite the revelation....okay, to be perfectly honest it was my third time watching this prolific film. Yes,  I said it was prolific!!! Maybe I am overreacting,but this movie was my epiphany!!!!!! I have suffered from my own "daddy issues" for years. I have seen these issues cause me to enact unhealthy behaviors for as long as I can remember.

My childhood crushes, bad boys by right, potential laden- and without the guidance to bring it to fruition. The choosing of my childrens' fathers brings a chill down my spine as I recount all the useless sh*t that I believed and chose to endure...abuse in a physical manner, verbal and emotional were my breakfast, lunch and dinner. I allowed myself to get so caught up in the bull crap that I thought was for the best and for my children...that I allowed the pain that was synonymous with my relationship to be hidden. I allowed myself to hide away from the truth. To  hide from the reality that; inside I was dying and I was in need of help.

I shrouded myself in a false reality because I felt as though my kids deserved a happy mom, and a well adjusted mom. When in reality, I was neither of those things!!! I thought that if  projected a happy image I could become happy...I wasn't far off the mark...Manifestation is KEY!!! However, after watching and crying about all the close to home things that I watched "Mrs. Pamela Travers" experience I learned: I am okay.

When Walt Disney came to call on her in her home on the real life Cherry Tree Lane, he told her of his experiences with his own father threatening the 'buckle' on him and his older brother, Elias...all in the name of a timely and successful paper. Just as her own father had suffered in silence with his unfulfilling career, illness and his alcoholism. He was just trying to cope with his life and all his shortcomings. He was simply a man, destroyed by the pressures he put on himself as he had undertaken being a father, and husband.

But, what really clinched it for me was when Mr. Disney asked her if she wouldn't like to be able to remember it differently. 😔 If I could choose to remember the bad things in my life, as GOOD things in my life- things would be totally different! Right?! Right!

So, instead of remembering all of the times that my father was unable to be a man, and step up to the plate for me...I can remember the few times he did. The time he came to Capozio's to celebrate my fourteenth birthday and he and my mom didn't fight. Or, maybe the time he took to let me drive his car, or when he came to my high school graduation. No, these are not a LONG list of accomplishments as a parent. NO, he was not a good man. But, he was mine and at the end of the day I choose how I remember it; good or bad. Turns out, Walt and Pamela not only saved Mr. Banks- but me too!

And in this particular case; I choose to mend my kite!

"Oh, oh, oh! Let's go fly a kite, up to the highest height! Let's go fly a kite and send it soaring! Up! Through the atmosphere, up where the air is clear. Oh, let's go....fly a kite!"-Mary Poppins