Art by Mariana Crottollini (Argentina)
There are no hidden toys, toxic influences, or psychological manipulations that prevent my daughter and I from loving each other.
by Guillermo Cides
July, Spain 2018.
It’s summer here, and the hot days rush out early to take us all to the sea, pool, or any cool place that is worthy of beating the heat. But my fight is different. It is a fight for my daughter, for her rights, and for mine. It is the fight against the worst of all humanity’s selfishness: trying to deprive a daughter of her father.
That’s why I celebrate my triumph openly, because the law grants me, among other things, the right for my daughter to spend an entire month with me in the summer. And here she is now, in my house, happy every day and with a smile when I answer her simple question: “Why can’t I be with you?” “Now you can, my daughter. “You will always be able.”
There is no person in this world that would prevent me from being with her. There is no legal cunning that circumvents the established law. There are no hidden toys, toxic influences, or psychological manipulations that prevent my daughter and I from loving each other. And may I, as a father, do the most beautiful job in this world: influence her with my essence forever. Passing on the most indelible thing in a human being, that mark of childhood that will guide us in the future as women and men. Not even the infamous robbery of my mailbox, which landed two unethical people, one of them embarrassingly old and a grandmother, in the judge’s dock, will stop me from doing my job as a father, even if I have to go to court a million times. but so that my daughter has an equal father and mother.
They say that in every woman -who deigns to be one – an inner lioness.
I assure you today that there exists within every man—and I am worthy of being one—a lion willing to face the universe.
G.C.
