When I saw her post on Facebook, it made me smile. Showing love, respect, and a closeness filled with admiration, it was one of the sweetest Father’s Day tributes I had ever read. Along with a photo of her dad grinning at her and she at him, were these words, “…I love that we have the same laugh wrinkles and I promise to never Botox them away.”*
Lingering in my mind and my heart ever since, I’ve often thought on these words, because, while I loved my dad and knew he loved me—we would often laugh and joke with each other over a late night bowl of Cheerios—he had a hard time showing any type of affection, of telling me he cared. Maybe it was because he never learned from his dad—a sharecropper during the Great Depression, spent with the burden of caring for a family of eight—how to show outward signs of tenderness. Or maybe, as a 5-foot, 5-inch short Master Sergeant in the Air Force, he put on a forced gruffness in commanding his men, that he often forgot to take off when he came home. Perhaps though, he was just worn out from running two separate businesses so that he could, “put a roof over our heads and food in our mouths”—what I thought was his true love language, at least, until recently.
My dad and me
My mom passed away in 2013. As executrix for her estate, to my dismay, I soon discovered she kept every scrap of paper that ever came into her possession. There were tax returns from as far back as the 1960s in with Christmas cards from the 1950s, letters often started, but never completed and some that were never sent. Taking two years to finalize her estate, I had packed away to look at later, personal items meant for me. Two weeks ago, I ran across it. I don’t know why I didn’t see it before. I don’t know if my dad ever mailed it or if because of being young and self-centered that even when reading it the first time years ago, I missed it. But for some reason my mom had it—a letter he had written me when I went off to college as a freshman.
Dear Kim,
I have to let you know in a special way that I love you…. This old big house is lonely….
Maybe your mother and I can slip away some afternoon, drive to M.W. [Mary Washington] and take you and Pat to dinner. What we need is someone to laugh with and talk to…
Yes! Kim, I miss those short, little rides to school. Wish we could take a few more.
I’m looking forward to your coming home again…
Love,
Your Dad
Reading this letter, I began to see my dad showed his love for me as best he could. It wasn’t filled with the heartfelt hugs I had longed for as a child, but it was there all along; I just didn’t have the eyes to see. As strange as it seems, even though he is gone, the letter has opened to me the blessing of knowing his heart—that which I almost missed, even though it was always in front of me.
The letter
I don’t have my dad’s laugh wrinkles, but I do look like him. And if I could, I would say, “Yes, Dad, I miss those short, little rides to school, too. I wish we could take a few more.”
Heavenly Father, we live in such a broken world. Help us to see each other through Your eyes. Help us to see the loving intent of each other’s heart. Don’t let us miss one another.
In His Grace,
Kimberly
*Courtesy of Pam Morrow
