The Trilogy of the Father (2): The Father

"Why?" the little girl asked, sitting on her father's lap. The father placed his firm hand on her little, brisk shoulder and certain of the persuasion of his answer, he replied with a deep, soft voice that that's simply how things were. Back then, such an assurance by her father proved sufficient to solve her little worries. But somehow, now that her life seemed to have become so much more complicated, her adult mind struggled to accept any longer such matter of fact evidence. Maybe the questions in her life had become too complex to be solved by a fatherly hand on the shoulder, her life seemed mingled in a web of abstractions, or maybe her mind had become too demanding to settle for the simplicity of a child's answers, real concerns requiring concrete solutions. Her father was still alive, living a few hours away from the city, but for some reason the effect of her father's assurances, that still echoed that same paternal simplicity, that's simply how things are, sounded too distant to be audible any longer, drowned by the boisterous voices of practical concerns. What's is the matter with me? Am I not attractive? Am I too demanding? Are men afraid of a strong, independent woman, who holds the strings of her life in her own hands? Her father on the other hand had cried of pride when she had graduated from law school. He had never told her directly, but her mother spoke to her about how he told everyone that she was a lawyer in New York now, with her own mid-town office and with important clients working on deals worth hundreds of millions of dollars. But to Halia, it was not she who lived in an ivory tower disconnected from the world of ordinary mediocrity, to her it was her father who was the one on the pedestal, whom she respected more than anyone, for his strong will, his determination, having come to America as a hard working immigrant, sacrificing everything to be able to send his daughter to the best schools in the country, working mornings to evenings, to sacrifice himself to advance his children. Was it too much too ask then, to just want to be loved?