Dad's Love

Dad's Love

Chris called me, right after Christmas. I was surprised, because we had just done the big marathon phone call, with all my brothers and sisters taking turns, on Christmas Day. We hadn’t been able to fly back to California for the holidays; my husband and I had just had a baby and were trying to manage on one income for a while.

“When are you coming home?” he demanded. There was something in his voice I couldn’t identify. My usually easygoing second eldest brother sounded abrupt and harsh.
“Chris, I told you we just couldn’t manage it right now. Hopefully by next Christmas” –
“I think you’d better come now,” he said, as if he hadn’t heard me. “Dad’s just had a craniotomy and a colostomy and he’d really like to see you.”
That’s how I found out my father was dying of cancer, a vicious strain which hits everywhere at once. He wasn’t expected to live more than a few months. They had found out last August, after Dad retired after teaching English for thirty years, and started complaining of back pain. Chris called me in January.

That’s the way my family is. They are very quiet, reserved people; they don’t talk much, and never discuss difficult or emotional issues. Mother had written me back in August to say that Dad was having “some trouble with his
back,” so they were postponing their long-awaited trip to Europe. I was surprised; Mother and Dad both love to travel and they’d been looking forward to seeing Europe again, after many years in the States. Then I heard that Mother, who taught kindergarten, had taken a sabbatical. That seemed odd, since they weren’t going anywhere now. No one called me when they discovered Dad’s diagnosis. I could understand my brothers and sisters – each would assume that Mother would give me the news. Only Chris recognized she was in denial and got on the phone.

So, I picked up my baby daughter and my credit card; my husband drove me to JFK airport and I boarded the next plane to San Francisco. Elizabeth was just seven months old then, a spirited bundle of energy with crisp golden curls what went flying when she bounced up and down. Her eyes had just changed from blue to a startling deep olive green. People cooed over the handsome child in her bright pink snowsuit and asked how old she was. She was big for her age, and already pulling herself up to stand on the empty seat next to me on the plane. The passengers behind us were surprised to see her tousled head peeking over the seat cushions, and she laughed at them with such delight that they laughed too.
         
Once we got to San Francisco, I borrowed a girlfriend’s car and drove to Letterman Hospital. Mother was already there, of course. Dad’s eyes lit up when he saw me walk in with his latest grandchild, but he was so thin and wasted, I knew he was dying.
I spent a week there. We talked about the fact that he was leaving us. Dad seemed at peace, but on my last visit, he asked, “have I been a good father? That’s all I want to know.” His voice faltered and he couldn’t look at me, shifting his gaze to the dull hospital linoleum floor. All military hospitals seemed to have the same dull beige flooring, with flecks of grey. I smiled and touched his hand, once so strong.
“I remember seeing pictures of my first birthday party. We were on an ocean liner, heading back to the Phillipines, I think. You were holding me in your arms, dancing around, smiling. I knew you loved me.”

“When I was six you walked me to my friend Theresa’s birthday party. I had a beautiful new dress on. It was five or six city blocks but your long legs seemed to cover the distance in no time at all. I was excited, because I never had time with you all by myself, so that day was very special. You were always very busy, but you acted as if we had all the time in the world, together. Even though you never said the words out loud, I knew you loved me.”

I was thirteen years old when Dad taught me how to drive. He got mad at me for wearing sandals, and was kind of short-tempered at my timid driving style. But even when he yelled, I still knew Dad loved me. One day he came home from school and saw me in the downstairs hall. I don’t know why he did this, but out of the blue, he came up to me and said, “I want you to know, I love you. I just wanted to tell you that.” I don’t remember what I said in reply, probably ‘thanks, you too,’ or something like that. I was stunned, because we never used words like that. But Dad did. Maybe somehow he knew how much I needed to hear it. Maybe no one had said that to him when he was young, and he needed to change that. Later, I marveled at how much courage Dad had, to say those words everyone else left unspoken.

Dad’s words stayed with me, in the years that followed as I went through a difficult adolescence, then left home for college. I came back, once or twice a year, for a quick visit, but it seemed there was nothing to come back for. I brought them with me, into my marriage, then took them to New York when my husband decided we should move closer to his family. I said those words to my infant daughter, and later to her younger brothers and sisters. They kept me going when things got rough and I was alone.

Of course, the words resounded in my head, because I only heard them once. Both my parents came from reticent, Irish families where emotions were never addressed and certainly never expressed. It was a strict, proper upbringing, some laughter, some anger on occasions, but love was a foreign language. So, although they dutifully taught me about God, I never believed what the nuns said, that God is love. God was a stern and just judge, and I was nothing, not worth His time.

I’m sure, like a lot of children, I equated God with my parents, especially my father. If he was strict, then so was God. If he lost his temper and pulled out his belt, I could expect similar treatment from my heavenly Father. I could not relax and accept God’s love, because I didn’t know it existed. But that started to change when my father said he loved me. Suddenly, my idea of God began to change. If Dad could break that silent rule about speaking love into the emptiness of our lives, maybe God was much kinder than I knew. My father’s courageous action had opened the door, and the light of God’s love started to reveal itself. Just a crack, but the door was opened.
Then Chris called and I was home again, holding my father’s hand as he had held mine, so many years before. Only now, I was the strong one, cradling his thin hands in mine, so frail. 

We talked about the journey he was about to make. We were a military family, used to traveling. My parents loved to pick up and go: Hawaii, Texas, Japan, Phillipines, it didn’t matter, just to be traveling. Now, Dad was planning a trip without Mother – inconceivable. The two of them were always so close. But Dad seemed at peace with this final trip, sure of his destination.

Or maybe, not so sure. “Was I a good father?” he asked again, out of the blue, on my last day. My husband was running out of clean socks and wanted me home. I looked at Dad and smiled, because I knew the answer. “You told me you loved me, Dad. When I was a teenager; when I really needed to hear it. No one had ever said that to me before, but you did. You have no idea how much that meant to me, and how much it has helped me, over the years. Yeah, you were definitely a good father. That’s what fathers do; they love their children. Because you told me, I can tell it to my children, so your love keeps going, from one generation to the next.”

Dad smiled. He seemed relieved, and a little surprised at the effect of a simple phrase that had sustained me for more than a decade. He didn’t say much after that, just laid his head back on the pillow. He seemed very fragile, like fine bone china; the really valuable kind you can hold up to the light, and the light shines through. That was the last time I saw my Dad, full of light and peace. I kissed him goodbye and left, so Mother could have some time alone with him.

My older sister called a few months later, to say that Dad had just died. I cried, holding on to one-year-old Elizabeth who laughed because Mommy’s face was wet. When I hung up the phone, I couldn’t stop crying. I held on to my little girl and whispered softly.

“Mommy loves you, Elizabeth; Mommy will always love you.” Silently I prayed for God’s love, to come through, not just in words, but through my actions, so she would know. Now, my children and I talk about loving God and each other every single day. We look for ways to show His love.

So, from my father’s brave words, planted, like the tiniest of mustard seeds, more than thirty years ago, a powerful tree has taken root in our family. Twenty years later, Mother was able to say those words to me. My older children are out in the world now, with Grandpa’s love tucked in their hearts.

Love is the most powerful seed; it spreads and appears in the most desolate places and situations on Earth.  The apostle, St. John says “Love will be my weapon, and my doctrine.” We can believe in God’s love, and put it into action. All we need do is speak it into existence, and pass it on.

This is our call to ministry, to “love one another as God loves us.” People will say, “look at those Christians, how they love one another.” As St. Paul says, “What I have received, I pass on to you.” I know my Dad loves me. Maybe yours does too. Pass it on.