July 3, 2004 - Dad
Red Top Mountain State Park, GA
We are up and on the road again by 7 a.m. We plan to drive to Atlanta today. We stop at St. Augustine to check out the beach before turning inland. We turn west at Jacksonville and before long are crossing into Georgia.
After 12 hours on the road, we reach Atlanta and have a donated dinner at Sweet Tomatoes (thank you, Sweet). Then it’s off to find Red Top Mountain State Park which is 15-20 minutes north of Atlanta. By the time we find the park, it is dark. We are getting pretty good at setting up camp in the dark. The temperature cools off to the low 70’s which makes for a better night’s sleep.
July 3rd, 2004 - Bob
Red Top Mountain State Park, GA
As I was tired last night and going about business that I felt needed to be done, I thought to myself, I hope I don’t “work” this trip away. There are good things to enjoy along with the work elements (necessary as they are). Do my work and release myself to the moment, I keep saying.
Today was a long (but scheduled as such) drive from Miami to Atlanta. It’s all a part of the experience. There’s a long way to go and every day is special -- even the seemingly mundane stuff like long drives. It does afford good, uninterrupted time to talk and listen to radio-magazine programs on NPR.
It’s strange and more than a little difficult to see my dad get tired as he does or not be able to move or lift as he once did -- not that any of these things make up the core of who he is, but they are part of my perception of him. Seeing him slip a bit physically takes away the Herculean idea most boys have (or had) of their father.
I remember my dad as the iron man who ran 6-8 miles a day. The Bay to Breakers was a classic run where we’d drop him off in San Francisco (“it’s so early” I think I whined once or twice -- yeah, “poor us”, we actually had to wake up to sleep in the back seat as Dad and 10’s of thousands of other psychos challenged the Hayes Street Hill). We’d meet Dad at the end, struggling to find him in the sea of humanity -- but always finding him, usually by his smile and his arms in the air (complete with very sweaty pits -- dad was quite a sweater).
I remember when I was a little boy, camping at Big Sur (near Monterey, CA). We climbed what seemed like an insurmountable hill and my dad smacked tennis balls up at us. We squealed with delight as the balls came near us and occasionally hit us. I’ve been back to that hillside since -- it’s not nearly as precarious as it seemed as a kid. I had the feeling that any of these balls could knock us loose from our “hiding place” and we’d go tumbling down the hill to...well, I guess those leaves wouldn’t have been too bad to land in.
I remember, too, a time where Dad and me were riding our bikes home from church (I was probably about eight): A dog tore out of a yard we were passing by, barking and nipping at my heels. I was scared to death. My dad turned and fired a rock (where he got it I have no idea), he either hit the dog or scared it bad enough to have it scamper back to it’s yard.
“Keep your dog in your yard!” My dad bellowed.
A tear of fear turned into a tear of pride just like that. The hero’s legend grew.
Once when I was in high school, my dad (in nothing but his well-worn tighty-whities) unwittingly came face to face with a cheese thief in our garage. I mean it -- the guy was stealing ten-pound block of mozzarella cheese (my dad makes great pizza). When my dad opened the door to the garage, he and the thief took one look at each other, screamed and ran in opposite directions. A moment later, my dad regained his wits (sort of), went out into the street (still in nary more than those tighty whiteys) and tore the license plate off a van that he was pretty sure harbored the dangerous cheese thief. The huge police dog that eventually flushed the thief out of the van had nothing on my dad.
So now the flesh from his chin sags slightly. His jaw is often slack, an effect of Parkinson's -- sometimes making it look as if he has gone away. Part of him, physically, has. And though that hurts, I know his mind and spirit are fully in tact. I see Dad and I as two souls on a different path (at least, by the time I entered this realm). We have clashed or, perhaps even more painfully, simply not connected and not understood how to many times throughout our lives.
But I see now, in this blessed time we get to spend together, that we are far less different than either he or I once imagined. I love and am thankful for him -- all of him -- every day.
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