Here be monsters?
A selection of weird "it's been in the back of my head for a while now" posts about trying to find my biological father: Looking for Tom Coates (Jan 2002), On searching for 'father' (Nov 2001), Ring random people with my father's name (Sept 2001), Pictures of my father (Jan 2001). This might be the time to acknowledge publically that - in fact - I have been using Google adwords to try and get information about my father, which I know is a bit weird, but hey - it makes my brain hurt a bit when I think about it, so what do you expect? Rational behaviour? If you want to see the Google Ad, then it's here. Please don't click on it, as it costs me money and it just goes to one of the pages above.
My position on finding my father has always been a bit vague. I really really didn't want to talk about it with my mother. I didn't want to ask her any information or anything. And - of course - this would have made the whole process of finding him nigh-on impossible, assuming that I actually started looking for him seriously, which I never really have. And why? I think the reason I haven't is because I'm scared - scared of whether he'd like me, scared of whether he'd be appalled of me being gay, scared of whether when I find him he'll be already in the ground and that then I'll have only the certainty that I'll never know either way if he'd be proud or ashamed of me.
This all sounds a bit cheap-airport-novel to me, but no doubt in some way it's true enough.
So what have I done? In possibly the most half-hearted campaign ever, I've looked his name up on a few online directories (his name is the same as mine - go figure), and I've sent several dozen e-mails to complete strangers around the world with the same name. I've stuck up a Google Ad.
But that's all the trivial stuff. More importantly I've made myself very visible. My father worked in computers for crap's sake, back when you debugged machine code with ball-point-pens on big stacks of paper with perforated strips down the side punched with holes. If he was still alive today he must have been on the internet at least once, right? He must - sometime in the last ten years or so - have typed his own name into a bloody search engine? Right? And I've been here - the most internet-visible "Tom Coates" in the world - owning something like seven of the top-ten "Tom Coates" spots on Google. I'm like a bloody massive flashing beacon of findableness. I'm the fucking atom bomb on a dark night. And has he seen me? Has he arse.
I feel a bit like the SETI Project to be honest. Lighting up the darkness with a seeming infinity of radio waves and broadcasts. Radio, TV, Web, Print... I'm here! Anyone who wanted to could find me a moment! So why don't they come?
Anyway - now I know more than I ever have before because - dear god - I've finally had that conversation with my mother. I now know that the invisible parent was born in August 1940. I know that he went to the same school as Dudley Moore (which I think was Dagenham County High School). This was a surprise - in the back of my head I'd always assumed he was from Norfolk like my mum. This makes me more city-folk industrial by history than I'd expected. Apparently he worked for Honeywell computers and then 'Digital Computers' in America for a while. My mother said they chose him because he had a funny brain. And he evidently had a fair share of personal issues with his family. Apparently his mother died and his father remarried. He didn't like the new woman much it seems...
So what now? I know that you're supposed to take information like that to St Catherine's House and that they're supposed to tell you all about whether he's alive or dead or not or where he's living now - or if he's even in the country (or alive, which I'm beginning to doubt). But while I know what you do with the information cerebrally, emotionally I don't think I have a clue what to make of the whole thing. Just learning all this stuff was a strange and disconcerting experience - I could feel my brain squirrelling the information out of my conscious mind as quickly as possible, out of sight, out of the way. But I can feel it lurking, like an irritating piece of meat stuck in your back teeth that you keep tonguing but can't get out. And if you did get it out there would be no certainty that it wouldn't explode to massive inconceivable size, sprout tooth and scale and claw and take my bloody head off. "You've gone way off the map, Sonny," my mind seems to say in full Geoffrey Rush Pirates of the Caribbean style. "Here be monsters".
Comments
Please stay on-topic, informative and polite. I reserve the right to remove comments for whatever vague capricious reasons seem reasonable at the time.
Have you never known him or did he leave when you were very little? Is this need to find him about tying up loose ends re your own history or will you not be satisfied unless you can actually develop some kind of relationship with him? One thing's for sure after your post above, you can't just leave things half finished. You need to pursue this to the end even if it hurts.
→ Posted by: tamsin at August 17, 2003 12:39 PM
He and my mother divorced when I was two, I think. And I think he was around occasionally until I was about four, but I haven't seen or heard from him since then. My mother heard from him when I was about eight though. Nothing since.
→ Posted by: Tom Coates at August 17, 2003 12:54 PM
I'm not ready yet
→ Posted by: Thomas at August 17, 2003 1:27 PM
... and passing swiftly on ...
→ Posted by: Tom Coates at August 17, 2003 7:35 PM
My daughter's mother left us when she was 2. She's now 9. I have the same weird feelings. I know that she can read and I know she knows how to use the net. I am very very findable and I have no doubt that if she wanted to find me she could in seconds. It's difficult for both of us to know she could find us if she chose to and instead chooses not to. I personally would rather her not contact us as I want nothing to do with her. But reading your post I can easily see my daughter going through the same thing in a couple of decades. Good luck in your search. I hope you don't come to regret what you find.
→ Posted by: filchyboy at August 17, 2003 8:16 PM
My p&M divorced when I was about 2 too. I was brought up by an enlightened stepfather who made every effort to treat me and the three half siblings alike. Finally met bio-father's mother when I was in my mid-20s and I was holidaying in their city. Exchanged a couple of letters with him and we both lost interest before we ever met. My "dad" was the one who (for better or worse) did the fathering, not the impregnating. I don't wonder/care about the biological one and that's obviously mutual. I don't think he would have made any difference to who I am now.
But I will be interested to follow up on your endeavours, Tom, and to hear what you make of the experience.
→ Posted by: Ian A at August 18, 2003 7:19 AM
i'm told by my mum that i'm named after my dad's 2 favourite men. i've got the russell from bertrand russell and the shaw from george bernard. i count my blessings that i'm not called berty george (while had i been a girl i'd have been tracy anne). i mention this because my dad died when i was 10. as an adult i have grown to appreciate the importance of blood, especially as i have no relatives that i can in any way truly relate to intellectually. the mythologised concept that my dad admired these 2 thinkers makes me wish i could have an opportunity to meet him and talk with him. most memories of him now are very much based on photos. i'm aware that i don't remember his voice, his accent etc. and i can only speculate that we perhaps shared a similar temprament and mind. sometimes i have played a game in the street where i'll see a stranger from behind who bares a resemblance to him and i'll run through a fantasy that my dad isn't dead and this man is him. i could just go up to him and tap him on the shoulder. what will we talk about? what will he make of me? an acquaintance of mine met his dad for the first time and discovered they shared the same favourite books. belonging and biological rootedness are important things. i hope very much that you do find him.
→ Posted by: russell higgs at August 18, 2003 10:01 AM
Tom, I really feel for you. I have never met my father and finally called him on the telephone about two years ago for the first time. What had me finally grow the guts to pick up that phone was that I knew what a personal triumph it would be to realize that kind of courage, because I was really scared. Even though no relationship came out of that short call, I am soooo complete - both with him and most satisfyingly, with myself.
→ Posted by: Emily at August 19, 2003 5:57 AM
I think in a way that's tougher than if he'd never been around in the first place. To have spent those years with you and then never attempted to get in touch again... I can imagine how abandoned I'd feel. No excuse for that. Do you think there's a chance your mother may have stopped him getting in touch, considering it's obviously been difficult to broach the subject with her in the past?
→ Posted by: tamsin at August 19, 2003 8:37 PM
Anyway there's a programme on next Wednesday on Channel 4 called Looking For Dad (9pm) - a two-parter about people searching for their biological fathers. You may find it helpful in some way.
→ Posted by: tamsin at August 20, 2003 5:07 PM
Tom: very appropriate the title of this post: "Here be monsters" used to denote the uncharted territories, the place where the sea ended in an abyss, and untold horrors existed. What happened is that, once these sailors went on, they discovered a new continent, full of new ideas, stars, treasures, as well as its share of difficulties. But such is life.
I hope that your search end finds a favorable resolution, favorable for you, one that allows you to grow and find that piece of yourself for which you are obviously looking.
→ Posted by: Camilo at August 21, 2003 7:23 PM
Hi Tom
Dudley Moore went to a school in Dagenham fairly near to where I used to live,the primary school is in or near to Bonham Road in Dagemham towards Chadwell Heath its now an assessment base for special needs children but surely they would have records etc. Its a weird suggestion but the mormons in utah have a family tree tracing thing called "onegreatfamily" he could be on there?(Im not a mormon BTW)
Can you also trace voters lists in a certain areas I know thats how I would approach it.
More depressingly there are death and burial records, I hope it isnt that but at least you would know why he hasnt replied?
All the best Tom, it cant be easy, dont lose sight of yourself being wonderful as ultimately thats most important.
Karen
→ Posted by: karen at August 23, 2003 2:08 AM
I to am trying to trace my farther which is proving very complicated as i have so little information,its been nearly thirty years since he parted company with my mother and remained in Scotland.Like yourself i wonder if he would except me i doubt we have very little in comman and like you i have reached another dead end and wonder if i should throw in the towel.Yet part of me like yourselfcan,t stop wondering about our absent fathers.
→ Posted by: Tish MacDonald at October 23, 2003 11:32 AM