The ingredient for Fathers Day

Reflection // Seems to be lacking in my life. As I cruise down the Folsom Lake Trail in my Asics, it finally hits me that I don't have one to tell this to. For some reason, this year I realize how much a fathers presence can impact a child. It has never occurred to me that I missed him or imagined what it would be like today if he were still here. Funny, how these things lay below the conscious and resurface at the most peculiar times.

As I march in a rhythmic cadence over the gravel, I come up on a hill. Shortly cresting the apex I find myself alone among families near the shores. The same after each family. Children, mother, father an occasional grand parent. I stand back in my mind and I watch myself from above, trying to keep putting one foot in front of the other. I lose myself after a while, feeling a little numb and resistant to keep from thinking about those weekends with the dad and hating being out there catching fly balls. Or when he would call me to help with a project he had going on that weekend. No matter how much I didn't agree with his fathering skills, there is something that helps cope with the hard things in life when you have that fatherly figure who will pick you up by the collar, dust off your shoulder and tell you to get back in it. And for this I still dedicate today to the man I had hated, feared and loved.

Maybe someday I can set things right, to be the support and the strong one to pick up someone and teach patience, to endure and to believe in themselves. In this, I find clarity and a happiness that wells up deep inside me today. After an hour on the trail, I pack up the dusty shoes that almost need to be replaced, I take a deep swig of powerade and start the engine. I drive off never looking back, because I know that my day will come.