Sunday, February 24, 2002

1 p.m

Kentucky

. 

Sitting in the even brighter sun than yesterday on the deck of the cabin

Almost finished the crossword puzzle. . .couldn’t work on it last night because it was too cold to work in bed. . .could just lie under the covers and try to keep warm.

David went to sleep right away. He usually does his rambling loud snoring, keeping me company in the night.

I imagined a conversation with my Dad. He called me on the phone and I answered —oddly as I think of it now—it was a phone attached to a wall so I sort of stayed in one place as we talked.

I like remembering that now (but I didn’t think of it at the time) I was just thinking what his voice would sound like—would I recognize it? Would I think “I know this voice”  or would I think “I really didn’t expect him to sound like this?” Would I think it odd, funny soothing, confident?

That is what I thought last night as I lay in our bed, level with the tree tops, all under the covers except for my eyes—a hat on and a hood covering my hat—comfortable—thinking about my dad.

And I imagined telling him that, sometimes, I think maybe he came into my room when I was an infant and picked me up and held me and talked to me. I know he was very sick then but he might have done that. I like to think that he did. Sometimes, I like to think that I remember it. Although, I was only an infant.

Yes, he said, he did that several times but mostly he tells me about the last time he did it. He never did it for very long and he only did it when we were alone when the other children weren’t around. He wanted to have some time with just me. The other children demanded so much of his attention and he liked being with me. . .I was so quiet and small.

The morning before he left with my mother and Charlotte, their oldest child, to take the train to New York, where he knew he would soon die. He came into my room to say good-bye. He always thought me the most smilely of all his babies. He wanted to tell me things, something special, but he didn’t know what it was.

Having grown up with only brother, he was quite unsure of himself around his daughters. But he remembered well his own mother and he thought for a moment that he might put me in her care. She would know how to handle a little girl. 

She had never had one of her own nor had she any sisters but she was such a good friend to her sisters-in-law that she had several nieces named after her.

As he held me and coaxed my easy smile, he thought of his absent mother and laid me in her care. She, he thought, would guide me from afar.

The older children, he hoped, would be good and helpful to their mother but me, he told me as he held me close, my job was to make her laugh. Just smile he said, don’t lose your quick smile and remind your mother with your smile to be happy herself.

That’s all I remember about our phone conversation last night except that I wanted to ask about my mother and how he felt about her and I wanted to know what he thought of his own dying. . .with his having so much time to prepare for.

But I was tired and part of me thought that this idea of talking to my Dad was crazy. . .an almost full moon shone its white light on the winter ground When I got up out of bed to pee I could see from the high window shadows for the trees on the ground. The light of the moon was that strong. It looked like there was snow on the ground – the light of the moon was that white and that strong.

This idea was absurd talking to my dad…so I stopped and eventually fell asleep and so I didn’t learn anmore that night.