Where and how should I start my tale. Not at the beginning, because unlike what most people think, the beginning is not where things start. It is always the end which marks the beginning and makes everything fall into place. Besides, beginnings and ends are arbitrary. So I guess I shall start at my tale precisely in the middle, and then perhaps lead it back to its source.

My father died at 57, young for a man of his kind. He has always been a leader, a doer. If a word can define this man, it is accomplish, in both the verb and adjective sense of the word. He never understood what middleground meant. He always had his opinion, which he saw as 'the' opinion. But anyhow, my father died. One day he was up ordering people about and the next day he was dead like a bedpost.

I didn't feel much for him. I was the oldest and expect somehow to take over whatever role it was the man played in the lives of those around him. People without realizing it threw these responsiblities and expectations onto me. Unfortunately though, I was clumsy at catching these responsibilites, dropping them all over the place, and with these fallen disappointments, so too my standing in their eyes fell. Not that I cared, I never wanted their good opinions anyway. Not when I had to be constantly held up next to my father as if he is the light source which will make my existence clear to the eyes of these others. No. I am who I am. Everything I did made perfect sense in my own internal universe even if it did not to anyone else.

Perhaps there is indeed a greater power out there in the universe, churning out fates like well-tuned gears. And we are all part of this great machine and sometimes we find out how we fit into a greater scheme of things. Knowing or unknowingly we all play our parts precisely as who we are or think we are. I was never a big believer of fate so I never actively defied my destiny.

It was about a month after his death, I was going through his belongings, all the old books, pictures, trophies and letters which no longer held any meaning they were just things gathering dust like some poignant testimony to passing days and a resting place for the light footed dust. I came across this old box full of yellowing and moth-eaten letters with faded words. I cared little for his artifacts so I chucked it aside. It was quite promptly forgotten lying in the pile in the middle among other things which I could not decide were of value or worthless.

Then by some strange chance, I was among his things one day, I spotted that old box of letter and took it with me. Who knows why we do the things we do sometimes, perhaps there really is a voice guiding us to things beyond our own knowledge. That voice sometimes carry us to safety and deliverance and sometimes to forgiveness. But I did, I picked up that box once again and this time I looked into the letters. They were all addressed to my father by an old priest. I assumed the writer is an old priest because he kept quoting from the bible in the letters, and always at the end, he signed off "In the name of the father, and of the son and of the holy spirit. Amen" or sometimes it is "All in God's will. Amen" It was as if every letter was a prayer addressed to a man as common, unruly and disbelieving as my father. I was surprised to find that my father had kept correspondence with a priest for so many years of his life, I believe, judging by the number of letters, the letter exchange has started since my father was a young boy barely in his teenage years. He had always been the one to proclaim in that booming voice of his that there is no God but man himself. Now, finding these letters, I was reluctant to read them. Perhaps it is mean spirited of me, but I wasn't ready for my old man to suddenly become this secret saint with all this secret past which would so easily redeem him in my eyes. No, he would not get away that easily for all those years he had made my mother and I suffer in silence for his brutish ways.

I tossed those letters aside in anger, determined to burn them when the opportunity arise. In my anger, some of the letters fell out of the box, scattering on the wooden floor like ancient characters from lands long past. For some reason, they had a hold over me, a kind of power which stilled my hand from destroying them. Perhaps there was still room in my heart to forgive the old man even though I did not know it then. Perhaps seeing the pains it took for the old priest to write all these letters all those years softened my heart. But whatever it was, I could not bring myself to toss them into the fire with the rest of the old furniture chopped up into firewood.

I had wondered about the writer of all those letters. How did he know my father and why did he keep up his letter writing to a man like my father all these years? It made me a little sad to think that I had never known my father. Beyond the fact that he was the constant authority at home, dishing out orders to everyone around him, I knew nothing of him. Nothing of his childhood, his youth, his past. The letters made me wonder--who was my father, really.

I read some of the letters out of curiousity. One of them especially, stood out to me. All of them addressed my father by the name of Dominic, a name I have never known. My father always called himself Dom. It was Dom I have lived with and it was Dom everyone in town knew. This Dominic is a mystery to me. But this letter, the last of the lot read:

Dear Dominic,

I hope things are getting on well for you and your family. I heard that you have had a boy from the neighboring town's gossips, they sometimes bring me news of you and your kins. Your fame precedes you. It travels far and wide and it gladens my old heart to hear of you. It is a pity that you live so far away from me and I, being so old and frail no longer have the spirit to travel the distance by road to visit you, your lovely wife and your sprightly little boy.

But perhaps, my time is almost up. As these days go by now, I feel less and less energy in my body. But I know that my lord will commend me to him when I die. I have paid enough for my sins, the lord above takes pity on my old soul. These years have been long and weary and full of toil for my redemption. But you, my boy, I still do not have your forgiveness. Will you not shake my hand and give me deliverance from your hatred after all these years. My old soul is about to embark on its final journey and I would like a kindly soul of my own kin to send me off with at least a handshake. Will you deny an old man this? Surely, the wrong I have done you and your mother must have been repaid? Your mother, God bless her soul, gave me a last smile before she passed on even though I had been but a brute to her. But I was young and ignorant. And God knows, I have paid for it since. Every single day of my life I have lived in repentance. Now at my final days, come sit by me once again like you had as a child.

I pray with what short time I have left that I may meet you again.

In the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

I trembled as I read the letter. There was no name signed on all the letters. It was left hanging like an unspoken word, too painful to articulate. I looked up the town where the letter came from. It was not too far from our own town, three days of journey on foot would take me to it. I set off the very next day in search of the town from which this letter came, my heart full like a pilgrim. My journey and search took me to a quiet little town. I asked around and was directed to the local chapel, a humble little house of God with a quiet little garden. The Priest almost looked surprise at my entry. He told me they saw very few visitors in these parts and asked me if there was anything he could do. I showed him the envelop and asked if he knew the writer with that hand. "Sure." He gave a puzzled little smile. "This belonged to the old Reverend. A wonderful man, he loved children, but he died all alone in the end, with no one to console him. We could not locate his family and he could not say where they were." I asked if he knew where the old man was buried.

He was buried right in the garden of the church. I went out to the quiet little graveyard overgrown with beautiful wild flowers and busy with insects and butterflies. There among other rows of gravestones, one stood out to me, and I felt my eyes cloud over. It had the very same name I carried engraved on it, below it was a verse from Psalms 130. It said:

If you, O LORD, kept a record of sins.
O LORD, who could stand?
But with you there is forgiveness;
therefore you are feared.

Just then, a breeze blew across the field and I knew in that instance that all three of us have been forgiven.