Fatherless Son

Robert called yesterday as we were pulling into the driveway after Mass.  He’s always the first to call on special days: on my birthday, on Christmas, New Year’s Day, and yesterday, on Father’s Day.  Mass had been somewhat of a disappointment.  The priest’s homily was about the emasculation of fathers in the media, a call for men to step up to the plate and be real fathers.  By the time Kathy and I had walked to the car from church, we had shared the same longing; we had hoped he would tell the Good News and not just the bad.  We had hoped he would use Good Stories to give examples of God as a good father.  Why didn’t he remind us all of the father of the prodigal son, who watched from the hill every day for his goofball of a wastrel of a son, watched from there so he could see him from a distance, as he did that day of his return, hungry, dirty, and penniless.  Why didn’t he remind us that the father forgives, embraces us, shows affection and generosity? 

It was in my longing during his homily that I recalled my father’s laughter, playing with my older brother Dan and me, playing with us on the floor of the living room while our mom was grocery shopping.  He was often a hands-off Good Provider, quiet and private, fighting his own internal wars after returning from the Big War in Europe.  On these days when it was just the three of us, he would “rassle” with us, rolling around and pinning us, holding us away from him, us with our skinny little arms flailing, our little fists wanting to vanquish him, the strength of him, to stand on his chest and shout “We got him!  We got Dad!”  But we never got him.  He always won, repelling our four sinewy arms with his two strong ones, rubbing our necks under our jaws with the black sandpaper stubble of his day-old beard, his “I’m off today, no shave” beard.  And there in church, as the pastor’s voice droned on, I heard my dad’s laughter.  I reflected that of the six of us kids, it was only Dan and me who had this experience, of “rassling” with dad, of hearing that laughter, that delight in his little boys.  By the time the other two boys and then the two girls came along, our dad didn’t get down on the floor, at least not in my recollection.

When Robert called, I thought of his goodness in that.  I pictured him, the huge girth of him, the shiny deep brown face of him, the shining toothy smile of him, there in his cluttered little apartment on the East Side of Detroit, cluttered with things that are his now that he is off the streets, now that he is out of the joint away from the places where he was called dark-skinned and fat by light-skinned and thin “bruthas”.  The times we got together there in Detroit to fight homelessness form our contrasting angles Robert and I would talk, the young black single homeless guy and the old white guy with a house and a wife.  While we found in each other a mutual understanding, both of us quiet, deep, self-doubting and faithful, I always feel a certain guilt, a certain regret that I have so much more than he does.  And I feel, when he calls, a sadness for my distance from Detroit now, my cool summers up here, 250 miles north of his warm little apartment. 

I wanted to say something “Father’s Dayish” to thank him for his call, for remembering me even before my kids had gotten around to it, like he does on my birthday.  I said “I wish for you some good memory of your father, some good thought.”  His voice came back like a balled up little fist.  “John, I never knew who my father was.”

I guess he never stepped up to the plate, the man who planted the seed that would take root in Robert's mom, who I met, who had Robert’s warmth and solidity, who had his inner strength.  I guess maybe the pastor was talking to him, that man who wasn’t in church at all, who missed out on rassling with Robert, and watching for his son from the top of the hill, who wasn’t there to welcome his son and embrace him and forgive him for the foolishness that was understandable, him not even having a father.   

Too bad.  He has a son who is a good man, better than him.  That’s every dad’s dream, and he’s missing it.

 FreeLemonadeStand by John J. Daniels is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.