Dad

I’m walking down a sparse suburban street with my dad. Age four perhaps. Maybe five. Pine trees line the side of the road. I spot something blue, shining amidst the dirt and needles and cones. I stop to look closer, and notice the feet, the talons, the wings, the beak. Eyes wide open that feel mysteriously blank. This glorious bird, with plumage black and a tailfeather of blue, looks so serene, resting there in peace beneath the pines. I want to reach out and touch it, feel its soft feathers beneath my fingertips. I want to carry it home, put it on display in my room. Maybe give it a name.

It takes a bit for my dad to realize what I’m so bewitched by. He tells me not to touch the bird. I feel mildly hurt and confused as he shuffles us onwards down the drive. My thoughts remain with the bird, how serene it seemed, and how much I longed to touch and possess it.

I understand now that a parent’s core commitment is to keep their child safe. To teach them the realities of this world, to navigate them out of harm’s way when they don’t know better. I’m not a parent yet, but I have to imagine how instinctual this commitment is, how reflexive.

When I reach out to that little boy in me, his heart so set on touching this bird, my reaction now is much the same as my dad’s was, though with a bittersweetness. I want to pull him along, share with him of the hidden dangers of disease and pestilence, while acknowledging his want, his pure and innocent desire to touch this world and know it more intimately. I never got that last part from my dad. I left that bird encounter with an ache in my heart, an early taste of resentment. But looking back, I also see how he did his job. He kept me safe when I couldn’t myself.

The last time I saw my father was four and a half years ago. He drove down to Tucson from Denver, staying in a hotel up here in the foothills. When he first arrived, he came into my apartment, my palace, full of books and guitars and kettlebells and all manner of things I came to possess which I believed, perhaps naively, said something about me, about the man I was, and the man I was becoming. He took note of none of it, promptly sitting down and starting to talk about himself. Over the next four days, we would have a series of meals together—Mexican, sushi, greasy diner breakfast, Chinese, and so on. During those meals, he would talk and talk, often making snide remarks about people still wearing masks, about how the liberal media is ruining this country, about himself, telling stories I had heard dozens of times. He seems to show little interest in me. I just sat there and ate, well past the point of being full, until my insides were bulging with pain, while he talked and talked, completely oblivious to the kid across from him, wanting to be acknowledged and known by his father. When he leaves town, I am grateful. My heart aches again. I am resentful.

I’ve been thinking more about my dad of late. He’s attempted to stay in touch these last few years, frequently sending along cute videos of cats, and other silly internet ephemera. I respond maybe a third of the time. When I post on twitter, he likes and responds almost immediately, leaving little doubt as to whether he turned on notifications for my tweets. It irritates me, and I remove him as a follower. He stops liking and commenting, but I know he still follows along. Last November, during a period where I’d deactivated my account, he texts me wondering why I’ve deleted it. I know he wants to stay in my life, and I know he’s trying his best.

In early January he texts to wish me a belated happy new year, and asks how I’m doing. For some reason, I tell him the truth—that I’ve been struggling more than I ever have, that I’m devastated by a breakup with the woman I thought I’d marry, that I am broke, depressed, and not doing well. I don’t know why I gave him the whole picture, raw and distressing, when I could have simply said “I’m doing fine, thanks for asking.” He responded in the way a father should, in the way I’d want him to, telling me he’s always here for me if I want to talk about it. I’ve tried to shut him out, but that instinct, that commitment to keep your child safe, is still alive in him.

I’ve always known, at least in my head, that he cares deeply about me, even if I’ve rarely felt it. But in this moment, I do feel it. A small sliver of desire to reconnect, where no desire had existed for years. A tiny spark of curiosity about this man I’ve long believed I’d figured out. Maybe there’s more to him. Perhaps I’m ready to reopen a door I’d long ago forced shut.