Father's Day 2013

About two weeks after Henry died, I had a dream. In it, Henry and I were in the small court that passes as a front yard just outside the front door. Mama had not yet planted the raised bed that now fills most of that small patch of land, and what landscape there was consisted of a spreading of crushed white stones and a few flower pots. In the dream (which was a very short episode) Henry very suddenly and decidedly (but not angrily) declared: "I want a begonia!"

The next day, Mama and Dad went out and brought home a pot of white begonias that continue to flourish. We regularly take a few of the soft blooms to grace Henry's bench and did so today.

When I was six months old I was abandoned by my own father, and saw him maybe a dozen times before he was banished to a convalescent home where he would occasionally wander lost and naked in the woods before he eventually expired.

And after having my own son wrenched from my life, I find that I face every Father's Day with a full and heavy heart.

Not normally one for giving advice, this year I offer some modest suggestions to dads everywhere:

• Call your dad,
• Hug your child, and
• Bring them each a begonia.

-Dad