i Chat, he Hears

For the first time in a long time, I visited my dad's grave for Father's Day. He's been gone fourteen years, and I had myself convinced the sight of his tombstone would no longer turn me into a sniveling idiot. My brother visits more frequently, has developed a thicker skin. He waved his arm toward the horizon behind the rows upon rows of graves and pointed out the beautiful view. It did nothing for me. "I see dead people," I responded.

I was sure fourteen years would make it easier. On the way to our family plot, I moseyed through the narrow lanes of the cemetery as I used to when I was a kid, before I actually knew anyone buried there. Grandparents and great grandparents whom I had never met generally had little effect on me. Their lives had not been real to me, they had all died well before I was born. I was always far more interested in reading the other epitaphs on the way to our plot. Cemeteries are fascinating, filled with couples who seem to die within months of each other, folks who have been dead so long I wonder if there is anyone alive who ever knew them, children who died at inexplicably young ages.

There is the pair of stones for Morris and Gussie something or other, the ones my brother and I noticed soon after my father passed away. We still wonder whether it is the same Morris and Gussie who owned the candy store around the corner from us when we were growing up. (Even in Brooklyn, what are the odds of there being another "Morris and Gussie?") The tiny corner store was crowded and dark, and, though I never considered this at the time, probably filthy. Morris and Gussie were as unhappy looking a pair as I had ever known. Gussie always sat, her ample ass spreading over the sides of a short metal stool, her heavy eastern European accent dripping with disdain, and meticulously counted our pennies as if her life depended on it. Morris just stood by quietly, waiting for kids who had never once shown any inclination to steal to suddenly have the impulse to snatch a morsel. It amazed me that two people, surrounded as they were by sugary treats and smiling children, could be so dour.

I was surprised at how shaky I felt when I arrived at my father's grave. For a long time before he died, his physical presence was not a part of my daily life. We lived almost a thousand miles apart, there was no Skype, no Facebook. We spoke regularly -- as much as we could before my mother would take over -- but I had long become accustomed to not seeing him, to making do with just his voice. His deep soothing voice, a voice I long more than anything to hear sometimes. Visiting his grave, even after all this time, still gives me a jolt. He is only six feet away but invisible and silent. A lone weed sprung up from the neatly pruned bush marking his spot. I had the distinct feeling he had left it there for me, a sign that if I spoke, he would listen.

My mother strolled from relative to relative, weepy in part from their "gone-ness," but in part because the landscaping had not been maintained as it should have been, certainly not to the extent it had been paid for. My brother whispered to me that he was pretty sure Daddy and Nana and the rest of the crew could care less about the landscaping. Frankly, neither did we. God help those maintenance people if they don't do their jobs once my mom takes residence; there'll be daggers shooting up from the soil.

There's something about siblings. No matter how much you can be at each other's throats, you know each other. You have been molded, somehow, by the same sculptors, after all. Which is why, I think, my brother had the grace to suggest that he walk my mother back to the office so she could scream about the weeds while I spend a bit more time with my father, alone. A gift for me from my brother, on Father's Day.

We chatted, Seymour and I. I told him I knew he was, as always, looking out for me, and always would. I cried, because I miss him, because I wish he could be here sometimes to tell me what to do, to assure me that everything will be okay. I cried because I knew he must be crying too, a tear welling up in the outer corners of each of his sparkling green eyes. Because he wished I could hear him, know that he will watch over me to make sure that everything will be okay. I gave the weed a little tug, but left it where it was.

The walk back to the office was just long enough for me to regain my composure, to wipe the mascara from my face and resume my cynical bitch persona. I glanced over at Morris and Gussie on my way; for the first time, I noticed they were born in 1889 and 1891, and it occurred to me they were most likely Holocaust survivors. That they had probably lost everything -- worst of all, children. The pall in the corner candy store finally made sense. How awful it must have been to be surrounded by happy American children and sugary morsels. I wonder if there is anyone left to mourn them, to yell at the people in the office about their weeds.

"Fatherless Day," as I have called it for fourteen years, wasn't so bad. I was fortunate enough to have a dad who loved me, unconditionally, who will always, somehow, look out for me. And, though I can no longer see him or hear him, we had a nice chat.