Growing up, it never felt like my Dad and I were close.

I was the daughter who didn't live with him, the one who came on weekends to visit, while the rest of my sisters had rooms of their own. I always felt out of place.

I was the daughter that was difficult.

I could never express myself in words, the cat always had my tongue when it came to talking about how I felt. Unable to speak, I'd lash out in anger to anyone who'd cross my path.

I was jealous of my sisters.

They knew what it was like to live with my Father full time, they were the ones who got taken on family vacations, and they were the ones who seemed to nab all his attention.

To me, I was the beggar waiting for scraps. The daughter who came last in his love. The one who could be forgotten Monday through Thursday as if I didn't exist.

For most of my formative years, I never felt like I had a Father. At least not the kind of Father I dreamed of. The kind of guy who would drop everything just for me and always be there whenever I needed him. The kind of man who coud look at me as something more than an obligation and a child support check needing to be paid.

I wanted to be important to someone. But it always seemed I took backstage to someone or something else. Instead, I always felt abandoned, like a tiny kitten left along a roadside to fend for itself.

Growing up was hard, it was hard to catch the limelight in the shadows, and no matter how I tried, I could never shake the feeling that I would always be second best.

But as I've grown, I've come to realize that my Father has also suffered doubts of his own. I was the daughter he approached on eggshells, ever cautious of what he said, because he never knew the way in which his words would be taken.

I was my Mother's daughter. And perhaps he was threatened by that, thinking that my love for him, could never measure up to the love I had for my Mother. And maybe I let him believe that were true.

After KC was born, our relationship began to change. My Dad finally became the Father I had wanted to have all along. He took us in and gave us a home when things started falling apart, and because he didn't know what he should say, he didn't say anything at all, he simply opened the doors and let us in.

That single moment was a turning point, from there everything began to change.

Though it was clear to me, that my Father wasn't a perfect man, I no longer expected him to be. Rather, he became someone whom I could turn to and count on to be there, even if he wasn't very good at offering words of comfort.

But yesterday, I finally got to hold a piece of my dream. It seems quite silly now, but it's a moment I've waited almost all my life to have.

Yesterday, I was bound and determined to build a shelter for the neighbors cat who lives outside. Nothing much more than a ball of fur, I've been concerned that without a warm, cozy home, little Simba has little to no chance of making it through the winter. More than once, I've even given thought to bringing him inside. But Emma's not having it. Queen of the roost, she's bound and determined that our household remain a one cat household.

Still I feel obliglated to do something.

So I asked my Father if he had any scraps and after gaining an affirmative, began drawing plans inside my mind.

Collecting the wood from the barn, I took my plunder to the garage where I began measuring it, as if I had a clue of what I was doing. Smiling, I remembered a comment my friend Donna used to say, "If you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bullshit."

After going through my "I am woman hear me roar" mantra, I began looking about my Father's cluttered work area for a good place to begin. My eyes, of course, fell on the circular saw.

Now let me say right here and now, that I am no stranger to a workshop, having spent many unhappy hours there as a child. So to me, power tools aren't really a big deal. Although if you were to listen to my Mother, she'd tell you that the only power tool I ever came in contact with, was sanding by hand the good old fashioned way. Evidently, she's forgotten that I was a master with a jigsaw. But I digress ...

Fortunately for me, (and the power tools) my Dad came out to the garage just as I was gearing up my Norm Abrams imitation and decided that leaving me alone in his workshop was a whole hell of a lot riskier than lending a helping hand on my cat project.

"Do you even know what you're doing?" he asked, as I was still measuring every angle possible on the board I had chosen.

"Absolutely." I answered, swaggering over to the saw. "How you turn this baby on? I'm ready to go."

He gave me the you can't be serious, you can't even find the on switch Father look, trying his best not to laugh at me.

"I can handle this." I tried to assure him. But he wasn't buying it.

"Alright." he sighed wearily. "Show me what you want to do and I'll help you."

A beam of light flashed cross my face, and I could have sworn an angels choir struck up a chord.

"Really?" I asked, with all the excitement of a two year old let loose in a candy store.

"Really." my Father said.

"Really, really?" I asked grinning, quoting my favorite line from Shrek.

"Stacey, just give me the gosh darn wood and stop being a pain in the ass!"

Aww ... the sound of love.

28 years old, and I'm grinning like the village idiot for finally having built a project with my Dad and I'm not ashamed that I went in to work today, and told everyone about it. I finally got my show and tell.