People
It doesn't matter who my father was; it matters who I remember he was.
— Anne Sexton
Behind the line May contain spoilers.
Our reading
An editorial interpretation.
The speaker separates the factual man from the remembered one, suggesting that a parent's real influence lives in the version held in memory. What matters is the meaning the child carries forward, not an objective record. Memory, on this view, shapes identity more than biography does.
Context reviewed