What brings a tear to my eye this morning ...

 ...  I don't mind it when I wake up and I feel like crying any more.  I used to think that I needed to fix it and stop the tears but now I take a moment to embrace them.  Indeed, I sometimes take a moment to extend them ....  Like I did today.    

For the longest time, I guess I thought he didn't give a damn.  He was hard to read, hard to please; Yeah, that was my old man.  On the day I left for college it was nothing new,  we never had that heart-to-heart. He had too much to do 

I started thinking about all of the things a father should share with his son, and how Dick was lacking in those things.   I also thought about how I spotted a reflection of myself in the glass of the microwave oven yesterday.   I thought how much my reflection looked like my uncle Jim's face.   I always had a good rapport with my uncle; I almost felt closer to him than I was to Dick.  But I feel that way about uncle Mike too.   Those relationships were never complicated by the entire father-son dynamic.  So it would be unfair to judge them based on the same criteria but all the same  I noted it.

He checked the air in my tires, the belts and all the spark plug wires. He said "When the hell's the last time that you had this oil changed?"  And as I pulled out the drive, he said "Be sure and call your mom sometime." ...

Now and then, I find myself crying ... grieving the father I never had,  but also for the father I lost - Yes I Miss Dick.  You may not understand just how much that means, but that is okay because I do.    I miss many people who have come and gone.  I even miss some of the people who are still here ...  but deep down inside a little boy misses the dad who never actually did take him fishing.   Yes, even if that is the same dad who threw a beer bottle towards him and cursed because the little boy had not learned to catch a baseball.

... and I didn't hear it then but I hear it now ... he was saying "I love you" the only way he knew how ...

Having said that  ... and having had a good cry, I can get on with my day ...  and with apologies to Mr George Strait let me just say  "...  little boys dont just ove their parents  every now and then. Its a love without end, AMEN. ..."