I can’t say how many times I walked by without noticing him, out there by himself, sitting, waiting, happy. The front door sat wide open allowing the prodigal cool breeze, a breeze that seems to have been lost to us this summer, returning only now as the summer starts its journey into fall, to waft in through the beat up screen door. I had spent the last half an hour or so picking up, toys mostly, clothes and books and cups as well, but toys mostly. My parents were set to arrive that evening from far away California: the state where I used to live, as my six in six days year-old son likes to say. This explains the last minute picking up of the accumulated minutia life with two kids piles up on a daily, if not hourly basis. It would also explain my distraction, my walking by without noticing him, my picking up all of the toys with no help from the toy players-with.

It is fairly easy for me to get lost, for my mind to wander into places only known by me. To get lost in a thought a book a problem a website a TV show a dream. As my wife will animatedly tell you, I can’t hold a conversation and tie my shoes at the same time because I become either so involved in something as to block out the rest of the world, or am too distracted by something else to remember what I had previously been doing. If you find me walking around the house with one shoe tied it is usually because I have been distracted into a conversation or a chore or a scraped knee that needs bandaging, and in devoting my attention to the latter completely forget about the first task I was engaged in, tying my shoes. This trait or weakness or lack of memory, whatever you want to chalk it up to, doesn’t serve me well in the living of my everyday life while at the same time trying to maintain my relationship, my friendship with, my pursuit of God. Distracted by the routine, the mundane, the accumulated minutia, if you will, that life with two kids, an early morning job, and I’ll just be honest here, my laziness brings with it, I sometimes, often times find it difficult to keep up my side of this relationship, this friendship, this pursuit.

After several passes through the less and less toy laden family room, he catches the corner of my eye, just on the periphery of my focus, and I turn to look. It’s my soon to be six year-old son, Jackson. I look and I see him sitting on the front porch, waiting, happy. He’s not running around, not playing or reading or drawing, not roaming the galaxy impersonating Darth Vader or General Grevious, he is simply sitting, waiting, happy in the knowledge that at some point his Nana and Papa are going to pull into the driveway. His pure six year-old heart, his untainted mind doesn’t give thought to how long he may be sitting there, waiting there on the cool porch by himself. He thinks only of the reward, of the hugs and kisses and love that will be stepping out of that car, and as not to be too sappy, I’m sure somewhere in his head there floats images of brightly colored packages and tastes of sweet delicious treats.

I’m torn between wanting to see how long he will sit there, Nana and Papa aren’t expected for another couple of hours, and letting him know that he doesn’t need to stay there, that I can tell him a few minutes before they arrive so he can go outside and greet them with his eager little arms. So, in the meantime, I take a quick photo and then let my wife in on the proceedings, so she too can take a peek at this memory in the making, before I walk out into the just setting sun and sit down on the porch next to him. His anticipating eyes meet mine, his simple, innocent, pure smile warms me and I put my arm around his relaxed shoulders and sit with him for a minute. He asks me if I am waiting for Nana and Papa too, so I let him know about the time frame of Nana and Papa’s arrival, about the long car ride from the airport, about the dinner mommy has cooked being almost ready. I promise him that he will be sitting on this porch when Nana and Papa drive around the corner and make the right hand turn into our driveway. Through a bit of uneasiness, a little protesting, and his sweet eagerness, I was able to convince him to come inside and eat dinner with us.

I find myself seeing, finding, discovering how I think God works and acts and feels through the actions and attitudes and doings of my son. The picture I have of him out on that porch just sitting, just waiting, just happy. That picture pulls me out of my distraction, out of myself and into God. I look out again and I see God out on the front porch in the cool breeze of the now setting sun. I see him there sitting, waiting, happy. The crazy thing is, the thing that gets me, that tugs at me, that I know deep down and that I find both easy and hard to believe is that he is sitting there waiting for me. Sitting. Waiting. Happy. For me. And I don’t bring brightly colored packages and sweet things to eat when I arrive, I just bring me. I bring me and my mess. I bring my troubles and problems and laziness and distraction. And far too often I don’t bring anything at all, far too often his only company on that porch is my absence. And he knows all of this, yet still he sits, he waits, and he is eager for me to pull open that screen door and sit down beside him. And when I do find the time, make the time, when I do pull open that screen door, he is always there, always.  Sitting, waiting, happy to see me. And then…and then I get to sit down and feel his eyes meet mine, feel his smile warm me, feel his arm around my relaxed shoulders, feel the distractions dissipate. Sitting there I think to myself, I wonder why it took me so long to step out into the cool of the evening, to sit down with my friend, my God, and I try to tell myself that it won’t take me so long next time, though I know, as well as he that I will walk by that door too many times, distracted, while he sits with patience, waits with anticipation, and is happy in knowing I will catch him out of the corner of my eye soon enough.

{ 5 comments }

I soak up the warmth of the afternoon sun, my body drawing it in like breath. The rhythmic creak of the swing, on which I am pushing my three year-old daughter, is more adept than a lullaby. My eyes grow heavy, body relaxes, mind drifts. Junie is silent, content to sit and swing as long as I am willing to push. Her hair jumps up at the apex of the swing’s arc, then floats back down on her way back up. Little hands grip silver chains and hold up little arms in that familiar daddy-pick-me-up position. Innocence, potential, beauty all wrapped up by the soft plastic of the too big yellow seat of the swing.

My drifting mind recalls warm afternoons in the backyard of my childhood. My dad crouched down in front of a make believe home plate, glove out in front of him, waiting for me to deliver the ball from a make believe rubber atop a make believe pitcher’s mound. He would call ball and strikes; he had a generous strike zone, as I would pitch a simulated game. Six innings of balls and strikes, of pitching and catching, of father and son. I realize now, as my arms grow tired, almost bored from pushing, as the inviting warmth of the sun has morphed into a sweaty heat, that sometimes the small sacrifices make all the difference. While I am sure my dad enjoyed those afternoons of pitcher and catcher, I am also sure he could have found himself easily engaged in something else, something that he may have thought at the time more consequential.  I am also sure his knees and legs wouldn’t have minded one bit had he opted for that something else. But as I look back, as the heat takes me to a neighborhood and a backyard years away, I am certain there was nothing more consequential that he could have been doing. Just as now, although perhaps I would rather be down in the cool basement writing, or sitting on the couch doing absolutely nothing, I know pushing Junie into her bliss is much more important, much more rewarding to her, and in the end to me too.

This is not to say I always make that choice. Often times I find myself caught in the phrases of a not-so-great father. Maybe later. Not right now. It’s too hot out. It’s too cold. I’m too tired. I’ll be there in a minute, which turns into several minutes, in which time I am hoping Jackson or Junie has forgotten what they wanted me to do with them. I know as well that I in turn heard those phrases growing up, but the funny thing is I don’t remember the times when I slunked back to my room in disappointment. Times when I would come out again only to hear: A couple of more minutes, or not right now. Maybe it’s because the times of playing catch, of learning how to ride a bike, of backpacking, of ice cream cones being stuck in my throat and my dad being there to give me the Heimlich in order to free the trapped cone, outweigh the others. There was more times of yes’s, fewer of not right now’s.  More times of being there, than not. And I guess that’s not a bad something to strive for, to say yes more than I say in a minute.

My mind drifts back to the present, to the heat, which by an act of God, or a shift in perspective, is accompanied by a cooling breeze, Junie still silent in her thoughts, as I wake up from mine. A few minutes of shared warmth, shared happiness, shared time pass when I hear her cute happy Junie voice say: Ok daddy, I think I want to stop now. I grab the silver chains just above her squeezing little hands, and gently bring the swing to a stop. I lift her out of the swing and place bare little feet on soft green grass. She looks up at me as I look down at her, our inherited blue eyes locked in that beautiful knowing space that can only be occupied by father and daughter. Thanks daddy flows from her mouth and fills the air, fills my heart, my life. I follow her as she scampers up the tiny hill and up onto the weather-beaten deck, in through the back door and climbs up onto the couch. I relax down next to her and think to myself: I need to say yes more. She cuddles up next to me, leans her head forward to create a space for me to wrap my arm around her, and I know, as well as she that I will fail. But we both hope not as often as I don’t.

{ 7 comments }

There is something about fathers and sons and baseball. Something special, something fun, something memorable, something even ritualistic. In America it is almost something instinctive. Much like the geese we see migrating for the winter, floating in their familiar, child written V pattern, we fathers and sons perform our summer migration to the baseball stadium. To the cheers and groans and hot dogs and peanuts and laughter and conversations and relationship.

My five, well he would say almost six, year-old son and I went to a baseball game last night. It was his first, unless you count the Oakland A’s game his mother and I, and his papa, took him to when he was less than a year old. That, to be sure, was much more a ritual than a meaningful father-son outing as the steady, slow pace that is baseball induced naps, only to be interrupted by the roars of the crows which induced tears of fear. So, I consider last night to be his first game, even if it was just the Madison Mallards.

As we scrambled up the stadium steps towards our seats, I carrying two hot dogs, two cups of fruit, one diet coke and one lemonade, and two give-away Mallards hats balanced in a tall heap reminiscent of a Dr. Seuss contraption, my son in tow carrying only his excited anticipation to see the first pitch being thrown. It wasn’t long before I realized that I was the only one excited about the first pitch. His excitement was quickly devoured. Lemonade dry, fruit gone, hot dog demolished, except for the remnants of ketchup mustard and relish, which formed a clowns mouth around his own, my son was ready to go back to the play area we had passed on the way in. The bouncy house and sandbox, the t-ball batting cage and the cotton candy vendor. I forced him to sit through a couple of innings while I tried to explain the finer points of the game, and after a pause for thought he replied with: Are the Mallards the white ones, referring to their uniforms. When I replied that yes they were, he asked me why they only had one player. Realizing all the wisdom I had just imparted on him had somehow ended up with the stack of empty cups and hot dog wrappers underneath our seats, I replied a bit unenthusiastically with: Because they are up to bat, boy.

We made it through the next couple of innings, him asking questions, me giving more of an answer than he was looking for, both of us people watching and laughing and goofing off, trying to catch all the promotional items being tossed into the crowd, and almost catching a foul ball. Finally giving in to my son’s need of cotton candy, we made our way back down to the concession stand, and never made it back to our seats. We instead ran all over the place, looking at the pig head displayed to advertise the pig roast with warm kraut for five dollars: Dad look, disgusting. Looking at the much to pricey Mallards shirts and hats and baseballs and key chains and golf balls: Hey, we should get this for grandpa for his birthday. I eventually sat down at one of the picnic tables, holding what remained of the green cotton candy, while he proceeded to climb up and roll down a nearby hill a dozen or more times, dodging and not dodging the dozens of other kids sharing the same idea. I was reminded of the large anthill in our backyard.

We made our way through the jubilant crowd, over to the sandbox brimming with children, one of the littler ones sans clothes, and I feeling a sudden kinship with his mortified mother as I gave her the knowing look of: Don’t worry, we’ve all been there. While Jackson was busy making sand castles and sand cities and sand dinosaurs, I sat and reflected and tried to remember all of the baseball games I had been to with my dad. I couldn’t recall the first game we went to together, as much of the earlier games we went to together tend to amalgamate into a single memory, a single experience. Bits of this game, pieces of that, A’s and Giants all intermingled together.

The first game I remember with absolute clarity was the World Series Game in 1989. It was at Candlestick Park, in my opinion the best name for a baseball park ever, and the Giants were playing the A’s in the Bay Bridge Series. It was the first, and still only World Series game I have attended. My dad and I were settled into our seats, food on laps, smiles on faces, excitement in stomachs, waiting for the game to start. Then it happened. It started with what sounded like people stomping their collective feet on the stadium floor, which is not unusual being as that we were at a baseball game. But the noise, this stomping noise continued to grow louder and louder until I knew that this was not a noise created by people stomping their collective feet. Players began to run out onto the field, and the stadium began to sway. It was an earthquake. It was a big earthquake. It only lasted for 15 seconds or so, and I used to attribute this fact as to why I wasn’t terrified, but looking back I think it was because I was with my dad. There always seems to be security when you are with a dad who loves you.

Since then my dad and I have been to many games together, none thus far postponed due to an earthquake. We have also started taking trips to different stadiums, our goal being to visit all of them, together. As Jackson continued to make his art in the sand, I realized that all of the baseball games and baseball trips were not really about baseball at all. I realized that baseball might just be a good excuse. Sure there are the memories of touching the Green Monster, of surviving the drunks in the bleachers of Yankee Stadium, of watching the game with my new bride and my parents at Wrigley Field. But what I am finding is that going to a baseball game with your son, that instinctive pull, is really about time. Time alone with your son. Time to talk, to play, to relax, to bond, to share, to grow, to be father and son together. That is what I take away from those games, those trips. Reminders like a souvenir baseball that sits up on the shelf, only these souvenirs sit in my heart, those games, those memories, time with my dad, and now with my son.

Sand cities conquered, and sand dinosaurs extinct, we made our way, hand in hand to the car, the bottom of the ninth still being played in our background. Smiling contentedly, I looked down and asked Jackson if he had a good time: This was awesome, we have to bring papa here when he comes. And so it continues, I thought to myself, the instinct already forming deep down in my sons DNA. The urge for relationship, the instinct for that father-son bond. The migration toward each other, that for some reason, going to a baseball game provides. That, and eating cotton candy.

{ 3 comments }