Saturday, June 28, 2008
hello, old friend.
7:52 AM
this is probably going to be a clumsily written post, for I have been out of practice when it comes to dealing with the Human Experience,
and the feelings I felt then, and the beauty of what I saw, are things that are hard to phrase, and are hard to word.
but I will try.
Yesterday I saw the purest form of love I have ever known.
A grey-haired father and his son got on the bus; and I could tell from a glance that there was something wrong with the boy-- something about the tilt of his head, something about the way his feet moved (shuffle, shuffle, shhh) against the busfloor, something about the way his eyes looked out at the world whooshing past the bus windows but never quite saw any of it; never quite registered any of it. Though I suppose you could hardly call the boy a boy, in the true sense of the word-- he must've been about twenty something, though it was hard to tell. His father was around fifty, and the way he led his son on the bus (a shepherd leading a blinded lamb) made people pause in the middle of phone conversations/texting their boyfriends/negotiating into bluetooth earsets and l o o k.
There was an American dad sitting next to an empty seat and opposite his own son; and the dad saw the father-son pair get onto the bus, and got up to give up both his seat and the empty seat.
"No, no. It's all right, you can sit."
"No, please. I insist. Take the seats."
and for a brief moment the two fathers
strangers who had never, up till now, met each other,
who did not know each others' names,
who probably had vastly different jobs homes wives families histories stories to tell;
looked at each other and touched the other's thoughts in the way only fellow fathers can;
for a moment they looked at each other like they were brothers.
later on the seat beside the American boy opened up, and his dad sat next to him.
and there I was, the onlooker, always and ever the onlooker;
watching seeing thinking
and it was an odd juxtaposition, the two fathers and both their sons:
one with salt-and-pepper sideburns and Oakley sunglasses and an bluetooth earset; casting glances (when he thought the boy wasn't looking) at his son sitting next to him: an American teenager with pale adolescent-spotted skin and wire-framed glasses and silver rings and a black hoodie who slouched in his seat and paid more attention to Linkin Park than he did to the dad beside him.
another father in a chinatown kind of shirt (cheap but good, the aunties would say) and silver grey hair and the kind of round, jolly face that makes you want to go up to him and hug him; and yet there was a kind of weariness in his face-- the kind of gentle tiredness that becomes evident only in the faces of those who have known a deep and profound sadness, and who have endured far more than it is in their right to endure.
and his son: clad simply. most twenty-something young men would be decked out in their chinos and Police sunglasses and muscle tees, but not this one: this one wore market flipflops and a bright blue t-shirt and brown bermudas and a perpetual vacant grin
and yet the way he looked at his father was something beautiful to behold:
the kind of adoration five year olds look at their fathers with
(my daddy is a hero! they whisper in exultation)
but then the love and adoration and innocence are gone when they turn six
and we are sixteen
and he must have been twenty six
but oh I have never seen anyone look at anyone else with such trust in his eyes.
and every few moments his father would lean over and touch his autistic grown-up son's cheek with such tenderness that I couldn't help but watch;
and he would ruffle his hair gently and kiss his cheek-- once, twice.
I have never, in all my sixteen years, seen someone kiss another person like that-- to kiss them just because you love them, because you love them you love them you love them
without any trace of wanting, or lust, or tiresomeness; the person you kiss has no obligation to love you back and probably doesn't have the capacity to
and you know it but you kiss them anyway because
you love them.
both sons were absorbed in their own worlds:
one with a deep chestnut fringe swinging over a surly eye, and bobbing his head to the unidentified thrashing noises emanating from his earphones;
one unaware of everything around him; with his face lifted to the loving father beside him as his father kissed his cheek and stroked his hair and blinked painfully from where he was in the window seat, so that his son would not have to endure the blinding light streaming in through the window.
two fathers:
and for a moment I wondered if maybe the American dad was thinking of his own son, and remembering when the boy was five; when he would stretch out little toddler arms and burrow, giggling and shrieking like all little ones do, into his arms; and how the child would burble "daddy! daddy!" when his father swung him up and into his arms like a little diaper-clad aeroplane;
and for a moment I wondered if the American dad missed the little boy who was now the black-clad, silent stranger sitting next to him;
and for a moment I wondered if the American dad was sad.
then for another moment I looked at the other dad, the little round dad with the gentle eyes,
and wondered if he was sad because his son, in all his vacant gazes and smiles full of trust and unrecognition; would never have the capacity to truly love him in the way all dads yearn to be loved by their little boys.
I bet he was sad.
And still he leant over once more, blinking in the bright light from the bus window; and placed the softest, sweetest kiss on his vacantly smiling son's cheek.
"Greater love has none other than this: of a father who lays his life down for his son."
and it's true.
and so here I am, tonight,
writing a poorly worded little narrative about two fathers and two sons,
and in particular: a little round father and his son with the empty eyes and unassuming smile.
to the latter:
whereever you are: I hope you sleep soundly tonight; and like you, I pray that your son will one day wake when you are kissing his sleep-heavy eyes in the night and look up at you with recognition, and joy, and all the love you deserve to receive (for you have been a very gem of fathers),
and I hope he will reach out to you and call you "daddy"
for too long have you waited to hear those words.
thank you for reminding me what love is.
