"L EGACIES"

Written August 2nd, 1995, one day prior to my son's
sixth birthday (he was in California, visiting his mom).


Dear Daddy,

It seems so very long ago, that you left for better parts.  And as I look back on all the time that somehow manages to bridge the gap between the two of us, those many years that span the distance, a tear wells up and begins its slow trek down the side of my cheek.  Not so much because I am sad, nor afraid, rather because of something I've found.  I want you to know of that something daddy, something that somehow escaped us all these years. 

It's something only one's child could feel.  Something only one's father could know. 

I'd like to touch you daddy, if I could.  Close my eyes, reach out with my hands blindly, attempt to feel that scraggy beard you'd sometimes rub in my face.  I'd like to hear you daddy, your words of wisdom - tell you mine, as if I could were you here today.  I'd like to know you're within an arm's reach, feel secure in your warmth.  And of everything I'd like to do, there's still exists something of you - no of us - that I know never will die.  It's the love daddy - yours of me and mine of you.  That feeling still existing deep within.  Cemented, unbound, it provides me with a guidance nowhere else to be found.  And I just want you to know that I miss you more now than ever... 

Times were different back then, before you left.  People did things a certain way, and everybody seemed to do them so.  And what did I know, me with my lack of knowledge and experience, living for the moment as so many youths have always done.  I was far too young to understand, let alone think about the life that lay before me.  Child did as child was, and such established the pattern that was to drive me down that road, that winding path, almost to the point I've reached today. 

You and mommy only wanted the best.  God knows, the two of you worked so hard at it.  I can remember those short evening hours after your return from work, how you'd take me on your lap after the long grueling days, and laugh with me.  I can remember the stories you'd tell - of the many houses you'd built with little more than hammer and nail in hand, and the sweat on your back.  And if I think back to that very last day I saw you, there in that bed surrounded by rails, I can still remember that one solitary tear, the one that you shed.

(Continued on next page)