The Avett BrothersI’ve packed up my history, folded it, and put it neatly on the shelf. Every so often I glance in its direction, but I rarely consider the pattern of it. I seldom take it out and turn it over and admire how it’s built.
Amelia loves to ask questions about my family and childhood. She wants to know how it wove together. She pretends she doesn’t fully understand the situation so I will pull it out and we can unravel the story again and again.
I hadn’t thought about my father and Helen and Denny in ages. As an adult now, I can only presume how he felt when he was newly living in an apartment rather than our house. I imagine the good, alive energy Helen and Denny helped him find as they became friends as adults.
I don’t mind telling Amelia most of the ins and outs of a story where one hero dies and tells the other two to spend the rest of their days together. Those two find happiness until the end and that’s beautiful; what else can we really hope for in this journey? I think it helps bring death in to the picture of life. I think it also helps bring my dad back too (and two other really good people).
Amelia asked me if it was hard that my parents got divorced. It happened so slowly and over so much of my childhood. They really weren’t happy together by the time I arrived but remained toxically attached until I went to college. I was about Amelia’s age now when I first went to his apartment, so strikingly unfamiliar to the suburban life I was accustomed to. The small apartment was dismal mostly, somewhat dark, dirty and a little depressing. But then people would stop by or we would venture out (to a bar most likely) and a different kind of life streamed in: diverse experiences that surely helped me grow into a more open-minded person.
I still can see Helen standing in the doorway. I was so delighted to meet an adult woman that I was as tall as. She had a the sweetest little black dog that followed her around. I can hear his tags jingle as he came up to my dad’s open door.
Back at home on Sunday afternoon I would return to the life both my parents provided for me. I would run to visit friends in the last hours of the weekend and throw my clothes in the laundry room. My mother would try to wash the stench of cigarettes away while prodding about the unknowns of my time. I would prep my uniform for parochial school, mostly ignoring or hiding the underbelly of life I was experiencing on the weekends.
Slowly though, over my pre-teen years, the unknown became familiar. I could relish the adventures and freedom I was growing into as part of the natural progression of growing up. Looking back now I see how grit can be turned to pearls, how seemingly bad moments can be blessings, how you can find hope in unsuspecting places.