Dad's portrait hangs above the chair where I write. |
I have
been sitting with my dad a lot lately. It's not always an easy thing
to do. One minute I find myself smiling and chuckling, then the
emotion of loss and remembrance wells up. It starts as a knot down in
the gut and travels up, squeezes my chest, tightens my throat and
seeps through my eyes. I breathe deeply, it passes and a smile returns.
Memories sometimes behave that way.
I am
writing Dad's story for the current book that I'm publishing
... 'Our Fathers'. It will be an anthology of 20 stories, like the
first two volumes of 'My Mother's Keeper'. I am pulling in right at my own deadline because the wading through of it all isn't the simplest thing to do.
It's a
challenge to try to pare down someone's life into a chapter;
especially someone who had a profound and lasting impact on your own
life, and someone you still miss so very much.
I
usually do a pretty good job of keeping the emotions squelched; after
all, it has been over a quarter of a century since he left us. When
you stir them up so thoroughly like I have been, it's a lot more
challenging. The toughest thing has been to listen to a CD of his
voice – an interview that was done in the late 1970s for the
archives of Standardbred Canada. I had it for over twenty years
before I could bring myself to listen it. For some reason, I think it
would be easier if it had been a video. There is something deeply
moving about hearing a voice you love and miss come out of the air. You make a thousand pictures from it.
I
listened to it a few years ago and that was rough. This time, because
I was gathering information, I was paying close attention to the
details he was sharing. His voice brought me right back to our
kitchen. I could see him sitting at the table, not overly impressed
or enthusiastic with being interviewed. My mother is adding a few bits
in the background and more than once, the interviewer is instructed
to turn the tape off while something is shared that he doesn't want
on record. The phone rings in the midst of it. It was me. I remember
calling that day and Mom saying that a fella was there interviewing
Dad. I didn't think too much of it at the time as he was often being interviewed for newspapers and magazines. I had no way of knowing that decades later, I would be listening to him talking. It is particularly surreal to hear that familiar, loud telephone
ring that was part of my life for so long. All those sounds silenced.
Besides
his voice, the most touching memento for me is a letter that my
sister, Frances wrote five months to the day that she passed away
from leukemia. She sent it to him at Buffalo Raceway. Holding that paper, knowing that both of them held it
in their hands – picturing him reading it, feeling his heart breaking
in knowing that he would soon lose her, touches me deeply. I laugh about
what she says about Pauline but when she says about me “she is just plain lonesome for you” ... it sends a knife through my heart because I
still am.
And so
here I am... sitting with my Dad – his voice, letters, articles from the newspapers and
magazines, photos ... bits and pieces of the past that keep his
memory alive, especially to myself and my sister – the two deepest
connections to him that are left on earth. It is just the two of us who can recognize that telephone ring, can laugh about Mom banging the dishes around and know that Dad, with his dry wit, was choosing his words very carefully. It is us that have to pass his spirit on to the next generations. That is what the writing of his story is all about.
5 comments:
Beautiful mementos, Ev. I so see you in your dad's photo.
Mindy
Thank you ... that is such a lovely compliment :)
Ev
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