Fathers

With Father’s Day approaching, I’ve been thinking about dads. They seem to be described as either present and wonderful or absent, with varying degrees of disappointment.

My dad was one of the wonderful ones.

When I was little, I had a best friend named Kathy who lived next door. Not next door, the way we think of it here in rural Maine. This was on Long Island, New York, where the houses lined a long street, separated by driveways. Backyards and the street were where we played.

Kathy and I spent as much time together as our parents would allow.

“Can I go over Kathy’s to play?”

“Can I stay for dinner?”

“Can I sleep over?”

Each time one of our parents said yes, we’d dissolve into excited giggles, as little girls do.

One particular weekend, those yeses kept coming.

By the second day, though, something in me had run out. I didn’t have a name for it then. All I knew was that my battery was empty. My tank was dry.

I just needed to go home.

Not because anything was wrong.

Not because Kathy and I had fought.

I just needed home.

I remember leaving her house and making the very short walk back to mine.

My dad was mowing the front lawn.

When he saw me, he stopped the mower. The sudden quiet filled the air.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said.

And I was.

I walked past him and sat down on the front stoop.

Front lawns were kind of boring for kids. Ours was a modest lawn, a little bigger than the house, with a delicate Japanese maple casting a small patch of shade, dwarfed by the huge sycamores lining the street, casting a much larger canopy, a walkway to the front stoop, and a front door used mostly for company.

I didn’t need a hug. I didn’t need advice. I didn’t need anyone to ask questions or solve a problem.

I just needed to be near my dad, doing something normal.

I remember the cool, solid bricks beneath me and the slight roughness where my calves touched them on the step below. The resumed rumble of the lawn mower growing louder and softer as it crossed the lawn. The scent of freshly cut grass. The ordinary sight of my father pacing back and forth under the shade on a bright weekend afternoon.

And feeling my dad’s puzzled pause. Then, a sense he was satisfied that I was okay before he restarted the mower and continued the chore of mowing..

That’s one of the things I loved about my dad.

He noticed when something seemed off. He checked in. But he didn’t insist on understanding something that didn’t need understanding.

He trusted my answer.

And in that moment, he gave me exactly what I needed.

The energy of home.

The comfort of being seen.

The quiet reassurance that if I needed something more, he would be there.

But for that afternoon, the lawn mower, the stoop, and my dad’s presence were exactly what my battery needed to recharge.

Maybe that’s what fathers do at their best.

Without knowing it,

they remind us where home is.