A tale of two photos.

My father’s 1 year anniversary is coming up. My father passed away 1 year ago on Friday. We’re having an anniversary thanksgiving celebration on the Sunday. He is a retired Methodist priest.

My mother, to be quite frank is behaving like a bully. She has chosen a  ugly picture of my father, the worst one in a decade, to be the front cover of his anniversary celebration hymn sheet. There is no excuse for being a dick quite frankly and she’s crossed the line.

Everyone else, when their loved ones die, will use the best picture they have of the deceased. No one puts a retired police officer in uniform unless the deceased died within 12 months of retirement. Or it’s a particularly flattering picture. My father passed away in 2021, and retired in 2015. All pictures of him in ministerial garb are therefore a minimum of 6 years old. Which is irrelevant. No one puts a 6 years old picture on someone’s memorial when the deceased had professional pictures taken less than 18 months before their death. It makes no sense.

Then we have the utter bullshit argument of “if you want to want to put him in a tuxedo, then you need to call him Mr Smith.” Which is a complete fallacy. Rev is a title. My father died as Rev Smith, that is what is on his death certificate. That is a 100% fact. I have a copy of my father’s death certificate to prove it. So you can’t use a name he has not used since 2005 to describe him. In the same way you can’t use the name “Baby Smith” to describe me when I die because that is what my parents called me when I was a newborn and they didn’t have a name for me. Times have moved on, and it is an insult to call him less than he is because he is wearing a tuxedo not a dogcollar.

Then we have the narcissist argument. I’m being selfish and that I’m vain for wanting a picture of my father looking good. Yeah, you are right I’m vain. Its my father and its my money, so I get a say. I’ve left her with her ridiculous order of service choices that only benefit her, but yet when I have one editorial choice she refuses to play ball. When I insist on my one editorial change I’m selfish. Which makes no sense. If I’m selfish for one choice, what are you with 10?

Then we have the bullshit “African argument” which is the ultimate crux of why I don’t fuck with African people, because you can be as progressive as you like, when they want to do some bullshit “out comes culture” it’s a false humility to make him ugly for no reason. He’d have hated that picture being used. My father was not a vain man, but he was a handsome one, and extremely photogenic. Denying his photogenic nature is to put him down. My dad was extremely well kept and preserved. My mum had ups and downs with her appearance, my father? Never. He was always well kept, he always looked smart, he was handsome and he damn well knew it. So he kept himself in the standard for which God deemed was befitting the wonderful genetics and bone structure he’d been given.  So it is unnecessary, because it his thanksgiving service and part of that is to thank God for his life, and part of his life was that there has never been a bad picture of him…bar one. SO WHY THE FUCK WOULD A MAN WHO LIVED 71 YEARS WITH ONLY 1 BAD PICTURE TO HIS NAME, WHY? WHY IN GODS NAME WOULD YOU DISPLAY THAT PICTURE ON THE FRONT COVER OF HIS MEMORIAL SERVICE? Hell, why don’t we show them all our shame, like the pictures we have of him really sick on his deathbed? Why not show that? Because that is the most recent picture of him?  No? Why? Because we all know there are some things in life you don’t do. So don’t do it to my father.

Its something that royally annoys about my mother, and for that matter when he was alive my father too. They’re always doing the most to bring us down. I don’t need enemies, I have family. They’re always trying to make me small, and themselves for that matter. The hilarious thing is that I’m not even trying to say my dad is a supermodel. I’m just after a handsome picture of him. Which he deserved because he’s a handsome man. Why would anyone who claimed to love him make him small? Why list his achievements but show him as an egghead? It literally makes no Goddamn sense and she’s using this to hurt me, and to teach me a lesson. I don’t need to learn. If you are being a dick to prove a point you are the child in this situation, not me. Don’t involve me. You can’t be trusted with leadership. Just like dad power went straight to your head and you come sprouting “African nonsense” telling me about the devil being in control because I objected to a fucking ugly picture. Which is, again, why I don’t fuck with African people. The second they don’t get their way, let’s pull out the boogyman and Satan for some fire and brimstone shaming.

I told her that picture was an embarrassment to me, she didn’t care. I told her it was hurting me. She didn’t care. So I have stopped arguing with her. If she’s cool with embarrassing me, I’m cool with embarrassing her. I’m going to my aunts (her sisters) and going to go plead with them to make sure she doesn’t humiliate my father. If she does, then at least I’ll have fought damn hard.
This is without president. I, in 30 years of life have not asked for so much as a sneeze from my 2 aunts since birth. They had to be shamed into calling me when my dad even passed. Yet this will only get resolved if it goes external, because I’ll shame her into doing it my way. It’s the nuclear option but I really don’t feel like I have a choice. If she’d listened to reason I wouldn’t need to take extreme measures. Sometimes it is better to be right than agreeable. I’d go to war for my father, and it looks like I’m going to war with my mother over his memory.

Finally, it plays into a deep seated fear I have with my parents. In the west African tradition, there is such a concept as “to carry last” i.e. to come worst place, to have the least. My parents have done everything they could in my life to sabotage me and to cripple me to come last. I have been subject to unimaginable ruthlessness and cruelty. But that is me. I live to fight another day. But to do it to my father is completely unacceptable. He’s dead, he’ll never get to defend himself against that picture. We’re not doing anything more for him at least until the 5 year which means for the next 4 years the lasting picture people will have of my dad is of him looking like an oaf. And that is for people who show up to his 5 year ceremony. For those who show up to his one year and not his 5 year, which will be the vast majority of people, this picture is the last one they will carry with them of my dad. And he looks like an idiot. It looks like a selfie taken by an old man. My mum claims to have taken it. Which sounds like BS to me. Because my mum is 5 ft 7. My dad is 6ft. the way my dad is looking down at the camera, it looks like the photographer was below 5 ft 5 because he’s really looking down at the camera, in a way he wouldn’t be looking down if it was my mum taking the picture. Because my mother is never without heels. It’s a shit picture which I’d object to being in the damn collage, I objected to it being used for the souvenir. Yet my mother thinks this shit is acceptable for my father’s order of service. Well. She is incorrect. So let’s get ready to rumble. For my father, anything.

Grace and Courage.

Annetta Mother Smith.