I think my Dad confessed to something awful on his deathbed, Part Two:

Part One

Before I go into everything, first, I wanna thank everyone for their condolences and replies to my first post. I appreciate it greatly.

Also, I wanna address the concerns of my Dad molesting me or my siblings while we were asleep. So, I know anythings possible, but if anything IS impossible, it's that theory. I know he said something about what he did while I was asleep, but I didn't take it that way and let me tell you why I don't believe it's possible.

My Dad was a big advocate of locking doors. Ever since I was little, I can recall my Dad having us lock our doors from the inside when we went to bed and keeping the keys in our pillow cases. Weird, I know, but I guess country folk can get paranoid. Therefore, our bedroom doors were always locked incase of someone trying to ever get in, I guess. Probably not the safest idea incase something were to happen to us in the middle of the night, like, God forbid, but if one of my siblings were to have a seizure or something and no one could get in because they didn't have the key.

But anyway, we were all light sleepers and it was very loud when someone was trying to unlock the door, as the house was old and the inside of the locks were rusty and tight. My Dad never would've had a chance on any of us.

Also, when I was 3, my Dad was in a bar with some buddies, and a drunk man started talking about daughters and kids, and having his way with little girls and such, and my Dad beat the guy black and blue, almost getting arrested but luckily he was good friends with the Sheriff.

I'm not totally ruling out the idea, but I don't think its a possibility.

So anyway, yesterday evening was hectic. I had family calling me asking about services and viewings all night after getting the news. Majority of this family, I had never even met, but I took their word that they were a cousin, or great uncle or whatever because frankly, who would make up that they were related to my deadbeat alcoholic father.

You see, I grew up in a really small town in Missouri, isolated on a 60 acre farm. We didn't have much extended family as I was growing up and I had never known why, but later in life my Mom told me that both sides of the family were bad news and my parents just wanted to get away from them all. So, after they were wed, they packed up and got out of their hometowns and started over somewhere else, which leads me to my next point.

I should have mentioned in my first post, but I was still in shock and denial about everything with my Dad that I didn't even think to say it, but I don't have an Uncle Jim. My family spent Christmases alone. Holiday gatherings contained only my two older sisters, my parents, and myself. This never bothered my siblings and I, as we never knew any better. The closest I ever had to an Aunt and Uncle were my parents close friends, like my dad's farming buddy who we referred to as Uncle Rod, and his wife was Aunt Kelly. Anyway, their irrelevant to the story but I'm sure you get the point, I don't have an Uncle Jim.

Since all of the replies were mostly to tell me to talk to my Uncle Jim, and that wasn't possible, I thought I would dig for information my self before I spoke to anyone else.

I've been staying at my Dad's place since he started to get sick, as I live more towards the city. As eerie as it is, it also feels comforting to be in my childhood home. My Dad kept the house, as he was still a farmer and needed the land, so I've been hanging out here for the past month or two. It's a bit more of a drive to work, but I have been off work the past week as my Dad progressed slowly more towards the end of his life, and my boss granted me 3 weeks vacation time to grieve. Which also gives me time and opportunity to figure this out.

So last night I went through just about everything I could find. Every box, every corner of the attic and basement, every manilla folder, EVERYTHING, and found nothing out of the ordinary. It's also hard to look for something when you don't even know what it is that you're looking for. I gave up from exhaustion around 3 AM and decided to try and get some sleep..

Around 9 AM this morning I woke up and decided to try again in the basement as it was my last stop and I thought maybe I didn’t look thoroughly enough the night before. The only peculiar thing that I found was a photo.

In the photo, my Dad is standing in-between two other guys. My dad is holding up a rifle and is wearing his famous hunting boots, with his other arm around the man next to him. On the left side of my dad I recognized my 'Uncle' Rod, and on the right a man I've never seen before. My Dad has a great big smile of pride, but when I look at Uncle Rod's expression, it looks a lot different than my fathers. His eyes are looking off to the left corner, and he is giving sort of a half smile. While the other guy just has a bank expression staring at the camera.

It looks to be taken in the woods, but I don't recognize the surroundings, and I can see about half of a small log cabin in the background behind Uncle Rod.

I looked down at the date and saw that it was from March 3rd, 1995. I set the photo to the side and continued looking for anything else, but after coming up short, I grabbed the photo, went back upstairs and made a sandwich. I sat at the kitchen bar eating and staring at the photo speculating.

At first I didn't really know what to make of it. I have a lot of friends my Dad doesn't know about, as I'm sure he has a lot that I don't know about as well. Then I started replaying what my dad said to me and trying to relate it to the photo. I kept thinking of how my dad brought up the year 1997, and the photo was taken in 1995. It's the closest piece of information I have to 1997.

I know you will all be telling me I need to talk to my Uncle Rod, and I'm one step ahead of you, except I haven't seen him since my high school graduation party. My Dad never mentioned him either.

My fathers funeral is tomorrow, and I'm hoping that my Uncle Rod will show up, but if not, I'm lost. Hopefully he will be there and I can show him the picture and find out more about who else was standing there with him and my father, and maybe ask him about this Uncle Jim guy that my Dad was talking about.

Until then, feel free to drop some questions that I should mention to Uncle Rod if I see him, or anything else you think could help.

I'll update when I know more.