Driving, driving

As much as I like to drive, I don't look forward to driving up to Knoxville this afternoon, if only because it will be a long end to a day in which I find myself already yawning and wishing I got to sleep earlier yesterday evening. Unfortunately, I accepted a closing in Wrightsville yesterday which didn't end until around eight last night. Afterward, I drove cross country to the interstate, then drove up through the rain and lightening to the north side of Macon to buy gas and food at the Super Kroger. At this point it was after ten and most of the restaurants were closed or closing. I bought a couple of tummy bombs at Krystal and headed up I-75 toward Griffin and home. That put me getting to bed around midnight. The cats climbed in bed with me and let me pet them into a purring state of happiness. They finally let me got to sleep around twelve thirty. Not the best way to get yourself together for Friday. Hopefully this evening will be better.

Fathers

There was a radio show on NPR yesterday in which they discussed different stories about fathers. I was thinking about my career as a father, but also was drawn to some stories about my own father. For most of his work life, my dad was a salesman for IBM. He started his career as an engineer in Indianapolis, but ultimately changed to sales in Atlanta, which he performed until his retirement. When we were little, my dad would take us out on the patio during the warm months and sing songs for us while playing a guitar which had been given to my mother and was originally owned by my grandmother's grandmother. Dad played folk songs and old Dixieland jazz songs and spirituals. He had a broad taste in music. Later on my brother Frank and I learned how to play guitar on the same guitar, scraping the surface of the old guitar with our fingernails and picks we bought at the music store. When little league football and baseball became our seasonal passions, my dad was involved with that too. Despite his work with IBM, he always made it to our games and usually showed up at the end of practices from wherever his sales calls left him at the end of the day. I can still hear my father's voice rising over the other adults when I did something good on the football field. Later on when Kate was playing soccer, I found that I could motivate her sometimes just by cheering loudly enough for her to hear my voice. It was my mom's task to bookend my football career since she was there at the beginning of my first practice and at the end of the last game in college. As she dropped me off at my first practice, she told me to be aggressive. That still sounds as weird a benediction as when she first uttered the words. More normal were the words she said on the grass field at Georgetown University after our last game, when she said "I'm just so glad you made it through all those years without a serious injury." That sounded more normal words from a mother. It didn't matter that it seemed so inappropriate after losing the last game of my career on a last second field goal. As I trudged back to the locker room after the game, little neighborhood boys took my hand and told me how good we were and how we could probably beat Maryland. The same thing happened when I was a junior and we lost a game to Cedar Shoals in Athens. At the end of the Georgetown game, my dad was crying tears of loss and finality for my career. Mom was beaming joy. When it came time for my term as father, I loved to take Kate on daytrips. We travelled down to Americus and visited the Carter Museum on Plains and the 1850's village nearby in Westville. We tramped through the sand of Providence Canyon. When we visited Cindy's parents in Knoxville, I often took Kate on little trips to locations in the area. We visited Cumberland Gap National Park and the museum at Lincoln Memorial College. We saw the original Kentucky Fried Chicken in Corbin. I took her to tour Boonsboro. When Kate was about three or four I took her to the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey circus in Atlanta. I spent the extra money to get us seats down along the front row of seats, right in front of a clown doing tricks just for us. I was so excited and thought Kate was enjoying it too. Only later did I find out that Kate was afraid of clowns. When she was a middle schooler, I took her to Cirque de Sole. She seemed to enjoy that more. A year later when we talked her mother into coming with us, she whispered to her mother, "Most people don't know how cool this circus is." We've hiked parts of the Appalachian Trail and biked through Chicamauga National Battlefield. I've enjoyed every trip. I miss her now that she is in San Francisco. I enjoyed every trip. I still enjoy our opportunities to journey with each other.