I am looking at an old, faded black and white picture of my father taken seven years before I was born, and at least one year before he married my mother. They may have been dating already, being love-at-first-sight for both, it was not a long courtship.
He is standing in front of his brother’s 1937 Lasalle, and the only remaining landmark is the highway behind him, but I know exactly where he is, the highway being Rt. 66 where we would live when I was two years old. The photographer, possibly my grandmother, is standing with her back to her house; it’s past noon, a warm, dusty wind burns the nostrils with the exhaust of cars roaring past, and trains in the distance are a constant hum and clackity-clack.
His hair is bleached blonde from two years in Panama, and though the photo has lightened with age, I know his skin is tanned and he looks like how I always imagined The Boy from Ipanema* might look, oblivious of all the broken hearts strewn in his wake. By the time I met him he wore a crew cut that he would keep until the day he died.
I was born on his 30th birthday, but if I had met him on this day, at the age of 23, something in his bearing would have convinced me right away that I knew him. I would have crawled, toddled, or rolled up to him, climbed into his lap and claimed one of his big bear hugs while he planted kisses on my wind-tangled hair. I would have known without a question that he was to be my dad, that he was to be the man who loved me like no other, that he was to be my home, my refuge, security, identity; safety net, surety, and if necessary, my hiding place. He was a super-hero without a cape, judge without a gavel, a soldier without a gun.
There was no place on earth that didn’t feel safe if he was there: flying down the highway in our yellow dragon, huddled under a tent listening to sounds in the night, or standing on some stoney outcrop for a dizzying photo-op, he was home and he was safety, and he had my complete trust—a trust that was never betrayed, could never have been betrayed because it wasn’t in his nature to harm those entrusted to him.
He was a man made perfect in our eyes by his love, though imperfect in his human shell, but his shortcomings were hard to detect and easily overlooked because, far be it from me to put him on par with others insomuch as no one’s father compared, even when I tried to see him in my own eyes as viewed by others.
Our home was impregnable whether he was there or not, demanding a sort of deference to his indenture that repelled the bogies but entertained angels unaware, although this was a time when even crooks had the sense to know it. But an education awaited the ignorant as I discovered once when a young man grabbed me from behind and was swiftly corrected. It would be a long time before he even thought of bothering another.
As the father of three daughters, our dates applied monikers in whispered tones like “Igor” or “Impact Wrench”, which I assumed was felt in the handshake. There was never any trouble. As I got older, the notion crept over me that I would always carry this home inside me, though his aegis would extend only so far into the distance that would grow in increments over time. I understood that I would need to, instead, protect him from the uncertainties of my own folly; knowledge of situations in which his arm could not reach, and that I held a debt of respect to the legacy of this fortress that was my native home.
When I was three, we moved off our Rt. 66 home into a new, pink stucco house that he would live in for the rest of his life. To this day, I can’t think of one without the other, the two being inseparable in my mind. Though the house lost its pinkness and evolved to our needs, he remained the same, unchanging as a rock; the bulwark that anchored and protected us, sometimes from each other. Even his aging went unnoticed, disguised behind his 6’2” frame, a year-round tan, and his signature crew cut, so it was a shock when it was finally time for him to go.
His house, the very seat of our history that once sheltered us, became sad and forgetful, as though it too had to let go. Much like a tree that reaches maturity, it bore the concentric lines of lore that rooted our homestead, but made it increasingly hard to hide its own gnarled decrepitude. It began to suffer the slow bleed-out of possessions and memories, and then a ruthless stripping of decades of curated life. Objects that once charmed, passed with stunned silence into the hands of others who cannot know, until the very echo of us stretched and dissipated over time and space. A pyre would have been a more humane ending for it, but almost to our shame we lacked the resolve to strike the match.
Of all the places I have lived, and live now, they are merely stick and brick construction compared to the sanctuary of that home that was my father. His visits brought Home with him, and I notably slept sounder when he was there. When he left, Home departed with him, and I, being sensible of the impression left behind, could never shake a jarring awareness of my life beyond that pale.
Oddly, I should feel homeless now that he’s left this earth. But I know where he is, I know that he waits for us with the One whom he embodied, and I know that Home will always exist here because of his staunch regard over his family, notching an indelible imprint on the lintel of heart and soul; a guidepost to all who walk this way. This is an authentic Truth that cannot be lost, cannot be sold, or given away, or even diminished with time, nor can thieves steal it, nor fire or rust destroy it. It is simply one of those treasures that will outlast all the fortunes and upheavals of this present world, and what remains in that cold, empty place is my warmest gratitude.
*The Boy from Ipanema, by Antonio Carlos Jobim
He is standing in front of his brother’s 1937 Lasalle, and the only remaining landmark is the highway behind him, but I know exactly where he is, the highway being Rt. 66 where we would live when I was two years old. The photographer, possibly my grandmother, is standing with her back to her house; it’s past noon, a warm, dusty wind burns the nostrils with the exhaust of cars roaring past, and trains in the distance are a constant hum and clackity-clack.
His hair is bleached blonde from two years in Panama, and though the photo has lightened with age, I know his skin is tanned and he looks like how I always imagined The Boy from Ipanema* might look, oblivious of all the broken hearts strewn in his wake. By the time I met him he wore a crew cut that he would keep until the day he died.
I was born on his 30th birthday, but if I had met him on this day, at the age of 23, something in his bearing would have convinced me right away that I knew him. I would have crawled, toddled, or rolled up to him, climbed into his lap and claimed one of his big bear hugs while he planted kisses on my wind-tangled hair. I would have known without a question that he was to be my dad, that he was to be the man who loved me like no other, that he was to be my home, my refuge, security, identity; safety net, surety, and if necessary, my hiding place. He was a super-hero without a cape, judge without a gavel, a soldier without a gun.
There was no place on earth that didn’t feel safe if he was there: flying down the highway in our yellow dragon, huddled under a tent listening to sounds in the night, or standing on some stoney outcrop for a dizzying photo-op, he was home and he was safety, and he had my complete trust—a trust that was never betrayed, could never have been betrayed because it wasn’t in his nature to harm those entrusted to him.
He was a man made perfect in our eyes by his love, though imperfect in his human shell, but his shortcomings were hard to detect and easily overlooked because, far be it from me to put him on par with others insomuch as no one’s father compared, even when I tried to see him in my own eyes as viewed by others.
Our home was impregnable whether he was there or not, demanding a sort of deference to his indenture that repelled the bogies but entertained angels unaware, although this was a time when even crooks had the sense to know it. But an education awaited the ignorant as I discovered once when a young man grabbed me from behind and was swiftly corrected. It would be a long time before he even thought of bothering another.
As the father of three daughters, our dates applied monikers in whispered tones like “Igor” or “Impact Wrench”, which I assumed was felt in the handshake. There was never any trouble. As I got older, the notion crept over me that I would always carry this home inside me, though his aegis would extend only so far into the distance that would grow in increments over time. I understood that I would need to, instead, protect him from the uncertainties of my own folly; knowledge of situations in which his arm could not reach, and that I held a debt of respect to the legacy of this fortress that was my native home.
When I was three, we moved off our Rt. 66 home into a new, pink stucco house that he would live in for the rest of his life. To this day, I can’t think of one without the other, the two being inseparable in my mind. Though the house lost its pinkness and evolved to our needs, he remained the same, unchanging as a rock; the bulwark that anchored and protected us, sometimes from each other. Even his aging went unnoticed, disguised behind his 6’2” frame, a year-round tan, and his signature crew cut, so it was a shock when it was finally time for him to go.
His house, the very seat of our history that once sheltered us, became sad and forgetful, as though it too had to let go. Much like a tree that reaches maturity, it bore the concentric lines of lore that rooted our homestead, but made it increasingly hard to hide its own gnarled decrepitude. It began to suffer the slow bleed-out of possessions and memories, and then a ruthless stripping of decades of curated life. Objects that once charmed, passed with stunned silence into the hands of others who cannot know, until the very echo of us stretched and dissipated over time and space. A pyre would have been a more humane ending for it, but almost to our shame we lacked the resolve to strike the match.
Of all the places I have lived, and live now, they are merely stick and brick construction compared to the sanctuary of that home that was my father. His visits brought Home with him, and I notably slept sounder when he was there. When he left, Home departed with him, and I, being sensible of the impression left behind, could never shake a jarring awareness of my life beyond that pale.
Oddly, I should feel homeless now that he’s left this earth. But I know where he is, I know that he waits for us with the One whom he embodied, and I know that Home will always exist here because of his staunch regard over his family, notching an indelible imprint on the lintel of heart and soul; a guidepost to all who walk this way. This is an authentic Truth that cannot be lost, cannot be sold, or given away, or even diminished with time, nor can thieves steal it, nor fire or rust destroy it. It is simply one of those treasures that will outlast all the fortunes and upheavals of this present world, and what remains in that cold, empty place is my warmest gratitude.
*The Boy from Ipanema, by Antonio Carlos Jobim
