It was three weeks past her birthday when her dad called.<\/p>\n
Dad \u2014 with the weathered hands and pale blue eyes.<\/p>\n
Dad, who served her TV dinners on her visits.<\/p>\n
Dad, whose love for language runs rippling through her veins.<\/p>\n
He began the conversation with her mother.<\/p>\n
\u201cHow\u2019s her health?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s fine,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd otherwise?\u201d he asked, hungry for an update \u2014 a new boyfriend? a new job? Does she miss me?<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s the same,\u201d she reassured him, then Mom was put to rest.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s strange how Mom\u2019s become, she thought \u2014 in the years they\u2019ve been apart \u2014 the ice breaker in these conversations. No matter where they end up, no matter where they go, they always start with Mom.<\/p>\n
As was format, she then asked about Dad\u2019s family. The phone call swung around upon its axis.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, tell me about Sissy,\u201d she said. Sissy\u2019s her half-sister.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe\u2019s driving,\u201d Dad said.<\/p>\n
\u201cReally?\u201d she said smiling, with Dad\u2019s collie in the background.<\/p>\n
\u201cLife moves too fast,\u201d he said, as the dog whined for attention.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt does,\u201d she said agreeing. Yes, it does.<\/p>\n
Then for a moment she turned inward; the phone call lay suspended; pictures flashed before her eyes:<\/p>\n
She was sitting in a tide pool \u2026 5 or 6 years old \u2026 while the water coursed and crashed around her feet \u2026 while the seagulls screamed and foraged overhead \u2026 while Dad and Mom ran laughing on the beach \u2026<\/p>\n
These images dissolved. She was sitting in New York \u2014 with Dad and his dad at the kitchen table. The two conversed in Yiddish.<\/p>\n
She could smell the crepes and bug spray, when the sound of Dad\u2019s voice beckoned from the phone:<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll be sending something to you for your birthday \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
The smell of the apartment slowly faded.<\/p>\n
She struggled; she finally found her bearings.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlease, Dad,\u201d she said, remembering and bristling at the thought of the year he sent the hand-clipped coupons.<\/p>\n
\u201cLet\u2019s make it simple. Just a book.\u201d<\/p>\n
In her mind she pictured Dad\u2019s floor-to-ceiling library \u2014 as a child, that\u2019s where she\u2019d often be. With its playwrights on the corners and Ruskies on the sides, Flannery O\u2019Connor owned the middle. She was sitting on Dad\u2019s lap while he smoked his pipe and read. The tobacco smoke curled up to the ceiling.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll send you out a box,\u201d he said. They\u2019re back now in the present.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, Dad,\u201d she said, \u201cjust one. Let\u2019s make it easy.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cJust one?\u201d He hesitated.<\/p>\n
The conversation paused. The collie had gone silent; in the background beat the mantel clock.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ll bring it back the next time that I visit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Through the phone she heard the rhythm of his breathing.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a loan,\u201d she reassured him.<\/p>\n
And yet another pause \u2026 then finally his agreement.<\/p>\n
The phone call then resumed its proper course.<\/p>\n
There was talk of private schools and the cost of car insurance and the downside of today\u2019s technology. They rattled on and on, fulfilling all the topics, then said goodnight and wished each other well.<\/p>\n
*<\/p>\n
Two weeks later. A box was at her door.<\/p>\n
With hands and fingers shaking, she tore apart the package. Her heart was racing \u2014 pounding. She wondered what the book inside might be.<\/p>\n
Was it fiction?<\/p>\n
Was it mystery?<\/p>\n
Was it history or sci-fi?<\/p>\n
Was it one of Dad\u2019s pet Southern Gothic writers?<\/p>\n
But much to her surprise, inside the shredded box, she found not a yellowed page, or a dog-eared paperback, but instead a plug-in water sculpture. With rippling rocks and UL guarantee. Just like the one inside her dentist\u2019s office. The water, they say, masks the sound of screaming.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut where\u2019s my book?\u2019 she said, shaking out the box.<\/p>\n
The book was nowhere to be found.<\/p>\n
Then she recalled a gentle heartache with her dad \u2014 a heartache that she often overlooked: that Dad can be partaking in a cogent conversation and later not remember what was said \u2026<\/p>\n
With heavy heart, she tendered her acceptance.<\/p>\n
She placed the water sculpture on a table near her bed. That night she filled its basin full of water.<\/p>\n
As she dreamed her dreams that night, she was a girl of 5 or 6, in the summer with her parents up in Maine. The water spun and splashed as the gulls cried overhead. In the morning she\u2019d forgotten about the book.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It was three weeks past her birthday when her dad called. Dad \u2014 with the weathered hands and pale blue eyes. Dad, who served her TV dinners on her visits. Dad, whose love for language runs rippling through her veins. He began the conversation with her mother. \u201cHow\u2019s her health?\u201d he asked. \u201cShe\u2019s fine,\u201d she…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1029\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}