Fathers and sons

Many years ago I made a shallow attempt to start writing again. I was a new mom spending my days at home with a new babe. Something about all that time on my hands encouraged me to find my words again. It had been too long. A part of me remained void without a notebook filled by scrawls and scratches tucked under my arm. I was empowered by the thought of reconnecting with that piece of myself and took small steps to get there.

When I finally turned on the faucet a black slop gooped out. After a few days the slop was thinning but it was still a rusty old copper color. I decided I needed some outer inspiration. Something akin to those freewrites I was so fond of in high school. So I asked my husband to give me a subject. Any subject. Something to prompt me. To move me. To help me focus.

Write about fathers and sons, he said.

I think I may have gulped, turned to the computer, and stared at a blank screen for hours. Wrote fifteen words and deleted fifteen words. Over and over again. I hardly knew enough. The relationship between my brother and my dad had always seemed so factual and only slightly peppered with emotion. That’s a problem when you are the type of person who almost exclusively writes based on thoughts that come from feelings. The relationship between my husband and our first son was too new to understand. I didn’t yet know what it meant to be a father looking down at his son, teaching him the world and expecting so much from him. And I didn’t know what it meant to be a son looking up at his father, looking for love and acceptance, seeking respect and reassurance every step of the way. I knew the sweetness and the love, but not yet the depth. I knew this:

All of these thoughts aside, my husband was still so quietly grieving the loss of his own father, a relationship that he was probably trying to resolve in his mind as if it were alive. A day before our first son was due, Dan’s father committed suicide. I awoke to a policeman knocking on our door at seven-thirty in the morning. He asked me to wake Dan and then he gave us both the news. I remember pleading with Dan not to go in the house. To go with the cops and identify his father through his belongings, but not to go in that house. I reminded him of the vivid images I have of my own father’s death and I didn’t wish that upon him. He understood and he agreed and he got into the car. Alone. Riding to the place where his father lay dead. His chances of nourishing their relationship with the birth of a child were squashed.

I can only assume he was looking for meaning in it all when he gave me that topic. Looking for answers to becoming a good father. To fostering a healthy relationship with his own son. When I asked him for the prompt, he thought for only a matter of seconds before the words rolled off his lips. Write about fathers and sons, he said. But I couldn’t yet. And so I didn’t even try. I couldn’t give him the meaning or the answers that he needed. I couldn’t even attempt it because I knew he was looking for something bigger than I could express at that time.

And now, seven years later and three sons under his roof, my husband has found his way as a father whether he was ready or not. I’m not sure he’d tell me to write about the same thing if I asked him for a prompt today. I’m not sure he even remembers that he did that so long ago. He’s more interested in my submission of our Beacon of Light conversations than anything. And yes, he humors himself. And he humors me. And I humor him. And we humor the kids. Because parenting consumes us with every step. And we all need a sense of humor. And lots of laughter to get through it.

While I know I don’t need to define the relationship he has with his sons, I do so kindly remind him from time to time that he is their everything. Oh sure, they love their mama, but it is Daddy’s shoes they want to fill. It is Daddy’s attention and admiration they so desperately seek. I see this in our seven year old more and more with every day, week and month that passes. He looks to me for softness, when it is needed, but looks to his father for guidance. Always. I do so often feel the need to remind my husband to look up from his desk and comment on the picture that was drawn, or make a big deal out of the soccer game even when lost, or participate in the homework endeavors. For the boys, it is the smallest of gestures that matter the most when it comes to their father.

There are 10,001 things that I could now write about fathers and sons. It is impossible to distill in a paragraph or a post of any size. This isn’t a tribute or a testimonial or a description of any kind. It is just my life. I have a husband. I have three sons. I live in a very concrete world of the relationships between them. The relationships they each have with him independently. The brotherhood that is forming between them all. It is a beauty to watch. And even though I feel lonely from time to time, and I bitch about the toilet seat and the dirty socks, I know I am witness to something nearly miraculous. My husband was raised with little knowledge of what a father-son relationship could be. Over the last seven years he has found the meaning and the understanding to be the father that he wants and needs to be. Time. Love. Patience. Discipline. Touch. And above all, Presence.