At family celebrations at my parents’ home, I usually end up at the kitchen table chatting with my dad. I tell him the latest, the things that would make it into Christmas letters and social media posts. But I also tell him all the other random flotsam of my mind. One day, about fifteen years ago, when my oldest son was a toddler, I sat there and complained to my dad about moms who didn’t want their kids to grow up.
In my mid-20s, with little experience of death or any sense dwindling time, I felt a lot of annoyance with other moms in my circle who cried about their child’s growth. So many moms I knew didn’t seem to want their children to grow up and I was bewildered by it. Why wouldn’t I want my kid to do new things? Why would I be sad that they had learned to talk or to crawl?
My dad told me something I’ve never forgotten. “It’s not always easy to see all you kids get bigger and move on,” he said as I gulped and realized, maybe for the first time, that I had asked my parent to dissect their parenting. “But I’ve always tried to focus on the positive. Even now that you’re grown, I can’t wait to see what you’re going to do next.”
I carry his words like seeds. And on a day like today, Father’s Day, I think about those seeds and what they’ve meant to me.
Words filled my childhood because my father loved them. He read the newspaper aloud at breakfast while I ate pickles (one of my favorite foods). He wrote poetry and stories, worked as journalist and later he wrote speeches. He knew all the lyrics to his favorite songs and sang them loudly and a little off-key on every car trip of my little girl years.
Even now, my dad is always reading something. I can’t name a time in my life when my dad wasn’t in the middle of a book and already knew what book he would read next. He has a system for retaining the information from non-fiction books. In my mind, I can hear the sound of his pencil scribbling out the key points from business books on index cards, methodically working at a barstool in my grandparents’ dining room on Saturday afternoons while all us kids, eight or so cousins, chased each other around and ate whatever sugary treats we could find. He’d look up and smile at us all, mumbling under his breath the words he had just read on the page. His excitement about words and about us kids are the twin hallmarks of my formation as a child.
Last year, when I called him to whine about reading East of Eden with my book club, I could hear him rummaging through books to find his copy. Before I could even finish my gripe, he started reading to me his favorite passage and expounding on the importance of John Steinbeck’s understanding of water rights in California. He’s still showing me the beauty of the word.
But not just the words in books that mattered to my dad, my words mattered.
I was about eight years old when my parents divorced. I lived with my mom most of the time and my dad moved about an hour away. In my childhood, he often worked even farther away, traveling with political campaigns and attending conferences.
But he called me every single night without fail.
This doesn’t sound as impressive now, in the age of smartphones. But back then, before cell phones, this was much more difficult. Every night, before we hung up, we’d coordinated a time to talk the next night. I can count on one hand the number of times when my dad missed our phone call.
I think about those nights when my dad would be in a hotel lobby asking someone to wrap up their pay phone conversation so he could talk to his kid at the time he’d promised. I think about those nights in my teen years, when I couldn’t stay out and do dumb things because I had to get home to pick up the phone when my dad called. I think about all the tense phone calls where we didn’t agree with each other’s choices.
How easy it would have been to let it slide.
I have kids. I know the ridiculous things kids want to talk about. They’ll tell you about tv shows or video games or their friends till you’re sure your brain is actually in that moment rotting away. I mean, how many parents actually listen to their children talk for ten minutes every day even when they live in the same house?
How unimportant most of the words I said in those phone calls really were.
How important those conversations were for who I am and the relationship we have now. The words my dad shares now matter to me because of the way he always showed me that my words mattered to him.
Every day for ten years my dad called me and chose to delight in whatever I was doing next. When words were all we could share, he made every word a planted seed of loving attention. He really did always watch to see what I would do next.
All our children are a kingdom not our own. We have the opportunity to scatter seeds and diligently watch to see if there’s growth. Then we can gaze in wonder as the harvest appears.
Or we miss it.
All my motherhood has been under the shade of my dad’s words: I can’t wait to see what you’re going to do next. I’ve seen all my children’s milestones with those words ringing my ears and beating in my heart, producing a fruit of joy in me as I witness my children bloom in first harvest.
If I have inherited anything from my dad, it is a love of words. I’m a writer like my father before me. My dad still delights in the harvest and I’m learning to as well.
Readings for the Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year B) on the USCCB Website
I recently had the opportunity to write some pieces on everyday spirituality for Catholic Bible Press, an imprint of HarperCollins. The first post, about our family rosary, was released this week (here’s the link). It represents a special milestone for me: my first paid writing gig. Even though I’ve considered myself a writer for a long time, this feels like a significant piece of evidence I could use to actually justify that claim (which makes it particularly exciting).
Thank you for sharing. Coming from a less expressive culture, I grew up in a stable and loving family, knowing my parents did their best. As a future parent, I am grateful for the opportunity to learn from you and other spirit-filled parents on how to nurture my own children. Thank you!
Since my dad passed away during the summer between my freshman/sophomore years of high school, I often cringe when I look back on conversations we had, because I would talk about the most asinine things, could be kind of a know-it-all, and just an angsty teenager haha. But I agree with you, those conversations were so important even if the things I was talking about weren’t.
Also congrats on the writing job!