After several years, I’ve finally found my father’s obituary, death notice and service Info, which was hidden at legacy.com. I took it upon myself to make a concise, prudent and truthful contribution to the guest book. This is what I wrote:
“I am Kenneth Kassner, Herbert Kassner’s second son. I’d like to speak my peace, now that I’ve finally found this page. There is no mention of my daughter Kelly, who was 3 years old at the time of Herb Kassner’s passing. He did not like her because she is the first blood relative of his not to have a Jewish mother. This does not surprise me, for I have always know my father to be Anti-Gentile. This obituary has also left out two others of his children, Gerald and Karen, both born out of wedlock. While I respect the dead and have no hatred for my father, I’ll mention that Herb Kassner was not a good man and has done a lot of bad deeds, being that he had no interest in his own children, so in the end he had adapted his third wife’s family as his own.”
I never wanted to have a bad rapport with my father. He was a brilliant man and would’ve been a great father if he was only interested. Sometimes, I learned a lot just form observing him with other people. He was an attorney and sometime I had gone to spectate court cases he was repressing clients in just to watch and listen to him in front of judges and juries, just to see him an action and enjoy the fascination of what he’d say there.
Unfortunately, it was not mutual. My father and I never had a happy moment together. From the day I was born to the day he died; he wanted nothing more than for me to just be put in a special mental home. Throughout that time period, he said horrible things to and about me. Before I was born, I was told by many who were close to him that he was pro-life. But after I was born, he started giving to Planned Parenthood regularly and generously. At that point his stance was “dysfunctional children like my son Kenneth have no place in this world”.
I created more friction with my father by resisting checking into any psychiatric home. I continuing to make a success of myself, which infuriated him. I don’t regret my pursuits for success, but I do regret ever hoping that I would have some sort of relationship with my father. I did the best I could to be a good son.
I don’t mind being vocal about this. While out of 6 children I was the one he liked the least, I was not the only child of his to suffer the repercussions of his bad actions and mental abuse. It turns out that all along, my older brother was the only child of his that he had any respect and regard for and I don’t blame my brother for that. My brother is a totally different person.
This all goes to show that every child deserves a mother and father. My mother never operated with a full deck of cards, and so it was my grandparents who raised me. When anyone asked me which parent I’d be closer with, I’d always say my father, because my father was so brilliant and so capable. I’m sorry that he only saw me as a dysfunctional child whose brains are addled.
It is always important to be truthful. People who really suffer pain from things in their life will honestly find productive ways to move on. Phony victims don’t know this and so they don’t know about suffering, so they make up what they see on TV, which is why it is fairly easy for me to understand real victims from gold-diggers and their frivols lawsuits.
I have always leaned throughout my life that if someone continues to be a victim, they train themselves to live with self-pity. But if they train themselves to be a survivor, they developed a slew of self-confidence. I have developed a lot of self confidence over the years and have learned to overcome my diversities. I’ve found ways to deal with it and understand the world around me and hope that others do the same.
