Back to Basics
Aug. 2nd, 2010 08:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
talonkarrde“And then what happened?”
Wordlessly, I turn the book around and show him the next page.
“It’s empty!”
I nod and take my father’s fancy old fashioned pen, dip it in an inkwell, and present it to him.
“And then,” I say, finding the room suddenly a bit blurry, “the father passed the book down to his son, who wrote the next chapter, and the one after that, and the next half of the book.”
“But I don’t know how to write, dad!”
“Start, I say,” remembering what my father said to me. “with the basics. With the noun and the verb, the person and the place and the action. Start there.”
Next week, he asks for me to read the story again, and I do, from the very beginning. It’s my story, one that I’ve written for him from the time that he was born, and it explains about his mom and I, writes out our dreams and wishes and desires. It explains our lives and our hopes for him, and the second half of the book is for him, his dreams and wishes, his life.
When I finish reading though, he simply thinks for a moment, and then he nods, and says, “Thanks, dad!” and rolls over, without writing anything. It goes like this for three more weeks, and I start to wonder. Did I ask him too early? When did my father ask me? What if he doesn’t want to do it? It’s enough that I do the only thing that makes sense to me.
I show up at my dad’s doorstep the day after, looking uneasy, and he reads me like — okay, I won’t say it. But he sits me down, and he asks me how things are going, and it all comes out of me in a hurry, about how nervous I am, about if I did something wrong, about the tradition and if there was anything I forgot.
He says nothing, simply takes out an old, beautiful, leather-bound book, and flips to exactly halfway through the book. And then he waits, and finally, after reading the page over three times, do I get it.
“...You wrote the first line!” I exclaim, and he nods.
The next night, I read my son the story again, and finished where I normally did. And then I paused, and took a pen, and I wrote, ‘His story starts here, with the dream of becoming an astronaut.’
And then I passed him the book, and watched, and waited. And he takes a pen — a space pen that we got from the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum a year ago — and puts it to the paper, and starts to write.
When I turn sixty, I get a phone call from my son, who invites me over for my birthday. When I get there, all my friends and family are there, and we have an incredible time celebrating the years and reminiscing on old times. He asks me to stay the night, in the guest room, and I do; it’s there that he breaks the news.
“She’s pregnant, dad,” he says, and I smile, and pat him on the leg. And I ask, as gently as possible, “Do you still have it?”
He nods, and reaches over to a chest that is on top of a bookshelf, and he brings out the book. Our book. And he pages through it, and he smiles, and I wait, and then he asks.
“How do I teach him, dad?”
“Start, I say,” remembering what my father said to me. “with the basics. With the noun and the verb, the person and the place and the action. And don’t be afraid to help him with the first line — much like you helped him with the first part of his life.”
Wordlessly, I turn the book around and show him the next page.
“It’s empty!”
I nod and take my father’s fancy old fashioned pen, dip it in an inkwell, and present it to him.
“And then,” I say, finding the room suddenly a bit blurry, “the father passed the book down to his son, who wrote the next chapter, and the one after that, and the next half of the book.”
“But I don’t know how to write, dad!”
“Start, I say,” remembering what my father said to me. “with the basics. With the noun and the verb, the person and the place and the action. Start there.”
#
Next week, he asks for me to read the story again, and I do, from the very beginning. It’s my story, one that I’ve written for him from the time that he was born, and it explains about his mom and I, writes out our dreams and wishes and desires. It explains our lives and our hopes for him, and the second half of the book is for him, his dreams and wishes, his life.
When I finish reading though, he simply thinks for a moment, and then he nods, and says, “Thanks, dad!” and rolls over, without writing anything. It goes like this for three more weeks, and I start to wonder. Did I ask him too early? When did my father ask me? What if he doesn’t want to do it? It’s enough that I do the only thing that makes sense to me.
#
I show up at my dad’s doorstep the day after, looking uneasy, and he reads me like — okay, I won’t say it. But he sits me down, and he asks me how things are going, and it all comes out of me in a hurry, about how nervous I am, about if I did something wrong, about the tradition and if there was anything I forgot.
He says nothing, simply takes out an old, beautiful, leather-bound book, and flips to exactly halfway through the book. And then he waits, and finally, after reading the page over three times, do I get it.
“...You wrote the first line!” I exclaim, and he nods.
#
The next night, I read my son the story again, and finished where I normally did. And then I paused, and took a pen, and I wrote, ‘His story starts here, with the dream of becoming an astronaut.’
And then I passed him the book, and watched, and waited. And he takes a pen — a space pen that we got from the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum a year ago — and puts it to the paper, and starts to write.
#
When I turn sixty, I get a phone call from my son, who invites me over for my birthday. When I get there, all my friends and family are there, and we have an incredible time celebrating the years and reminiscing on old times. He asks me to stay the night, in the guest room, and I do; it’s there that he breaks the news.
“She’s pregnant, dad,” he says, and I smile, and pat him on the leg. And I ask, as gently as possible, “Do you still have it?”
He nods, and reaches over to a chest that is on top of a bookshelf, and he brings out the book. Our book. And he pages through it, and he smiles, and I wait, and then he asks.
“How do I teach him, dad?”
“Start, I say,” remembering what my father said to me. “with the basics. With the noun and the verb, the person and the place and the action. And don’t be afraid to help him with the first line — much like you helped him with the first part of his life.”
