From Father to Daughter

Posted by T.J. Banks in HandPrints Stories & Videos | 0 comments

© T. J. Banks
The morning sun warms my father’s wavy gray hair as we stand in the field among the blue spruces. It’s my first time planting a tree: he shows me how to dig, pushing down on the edge of the shovel with my foot, then teaching me how to mold and flatten the earth around my sapling. There isn’t much conversation, just a quiet companionship, as enduring and solid as the earth beneath our feet.

Growing up, I spent a lot of time with my father. I was born when he was almost forty-six, and though he had told my mother that he was too old for another child, he was delighted when I appeared, complete with the thick dark hair and wide cheekbones we’d both inherited from his Romanian mother. One of his cousins saw my snapshot, exclaiming, “What a beautiful little girl!”
Dad simply smiled and replied, “Well, since we were going to have one, we had to have the most beautiful one there was.”

Later, my first job was to work with him. I’d fetch and tote his tools after school or on weekends, when he did his on-the-side storm door and window repairs: fifty cents a window and two dollars a door. In cold weather, I got to stay in the car until he needed me.

The expression “absentee father” was not in his vocabulary, in part because he and my mother had already buried three of their six children by the time I was fourteen. He was a down-to-earth kind of guy who showed his love in simple ways. I remember his being there if I had bad dreams, or bringing home freshly-picked strawberries, or some foreign currency he’d received from a buddy at work.

My dad was a man of great heart, even though medically speaking, his was a weak one; badly scarred from attacks he’d suffered when I was a child. But he didn’t — wouldn’t — let that stop him. “I’m better when I’m working,” he’d insist. Or, “You don’t quit when you’re half-way finished.” Or, “It doesn’t matter if you fail ten times — you keep on trying.” He understood people, too: their quirks, their fears, and the best way to deal with both.

Did we ever fight? Of course. But somewhere in mid-argument, I’d inevitably realize that our heads

My Dad

were tilted at precisely the same angle, and we were using exactly the same gestures. Mom walked in on us once and burst out laughing. She turned to my father and said, “She’s stubborn, just like you.”

Dad and I looked at each other, and I blurted, “I had to get it from somewhere!”

“That’s right,” he said approvingly, and our argument fish-flopped on the floor and died.

But there was one time when we were seriously out of harmony with each other. Dad had recently retired and didn’t care for it; I had transferred back home to a local college, and wasn’t sure if I had made a mistake. We sniped at each other. A lot. But by fall, Dad had found a part-time job, and I had settled into my new college. Shortly afterward, his sister came for to visit. When she pulled out her camera, Dad and I looked at each other. Suddenly, we moved together and put our arms around each other, dissolving the temporary coldness between us.

A cerebral hemorrhage claimed my dad a year-and-a-half later. In time, I wrote a short piece, “Watching,” that eventually found its way into a literary journal, Writing For Our Lives. Like my story’s heroine, I had made the conscious decision not to return home to see him again, knowing he wouldn’t want to be remembered that way….

Father & Daughter, Trees

I remember, instead, the man who taught me to plant trees; who took care of me when I was sick; and who somehow always managed to be there when we needed him. Once, leaving early from the portrait studio where I was working, I called home for a ride. But there was no answer. It was just a little after 4:00 pm, so I walked over to the local Stop & Shop. There was Dad, standing at the courtesy counter, getting his coffee and talking with someone, just as I knew he would be. See, I almost always knew where to find him. And on those rare occasions when I didn’t, he found me. That’s how it is with special people you love.

“Death ends a life, not a relationship,” the dying Morrie Schwartz tells his friend and protégée in Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays with Morrie. I learned that truth for myself when I lost my Dad. I’d hear his voice — low, deep, and rough around the edges, with its slight New England accent — coming out of nowhere: plain-speaking but kind, just when I needed it most. Only once, after my husband Tim’s sudden death, did Dad’s voice grow faint, so lost in this new harder-to-understand grief was I.

I couldn’t find Dad then, but he found me. One morning as I began running, he was there, as real as the road beneath my sneakered feet and the birdsong all around me. And, as I ran, I began a series of conversations with him: about Tim, about relationships, about my writing, and, of course, about his namesake, my daughter Marissa. His voice came back to me; strong, sure and comforting, as solid as the earth beneath us when I planted my first tree.

We haven’t stopped talking since. After all, that’s how it is with people you love: you’re there for them. No matter what.

Spruce Trees Photo by m.loeff