ProgenitorPortal

A father-daughter relationship can sometimes be complicated.  My dad, Kenneth Wayne Moats I, was and remains a wonderful father, and I am very blessed to have had him as a role model growing up.  However, I never truly bonded with him until later in life, when I was nearly in my thirties.  I can recall the profound moment I stopped considering my dad as some authoritarian figure in my life and instead started thinking of him as a friend.   It occurred in 1998 when my parents visited me in Gardendale, Alabama, where I escaped after my divorce.  One night, as I often did alone, my parents and I walked to a restaurant only two miles from my apartment for dinner.  Afterward, we grabbed a six-pack of wine coolers to drink while sauntering home underneath the stars on a crisp, perfect night.   As we leisurely strolled, the three of us easily engaged in conversation that altered back and forth from humorous to significant, inconsequential to relativ...