Thinking Out Loud In a Public Space

I’m not sure how cheery this will be so if you’re looking for something uplifting, this may not be the place to be….you’ve been warned. I did a phone install in a very lovely home for a very nice man on Friday. I thought it was a large house for one person so I assumed he had a wife and probably a family. Turns out we were there for his 94 year old father who lived in the house alone and whose wife had died a month earlier. They were married for 66 years. If that doesn’t stop you in your tracks right there, then you probably have no soul.

I didn’t see the father at first. He wasn’t anywhere near where I was working. He being 94 I assumed he was doing whatever 94 year old men do. I thought about how tragic it was that he had lost his bride of over six decades and imagined how I would feel if I lost my wife. I tried not to focus on it too much. I had work to do and if I got too vested in this emotionally, I would never get done.

I had to run a phone-jack through the closet to the outside. The son was nice enough to move a bunch of stuff around so as to make my life a little easier. I always appreciate even the smallest courtesy. While I was in there I started to look around; always a big mistake in my line of work. The closet was filled with clothes and shoes that belonged to a woman that no longer needed them. Most of the shoes were covered in dust suggesting that it had been a good long time since anyone had put them on. There were endless bits of a life stacked in boxes and shelves that had yet to be processed by someone that cared about them. You could feel the sadness in the air. It was heavy and thick. I tried to stay focused on the task at hand.

I finished running my wire and setting up my equipment. I went the extra mile to make sure that my work was ascetically pleasing even if it was a laundry room. I made it look like I would have wanted it to look if it was my father. I was pretty proud of myself. I collected the small amount of rappers and wire that I had left over and popped into the adjacent kitchen to toss the bits into the trash can. Then I saw him…

 There he sat. 94 years of living compressed into a small chair at a small breakfast table that he probably had enumerable meals with someone that he cared for more than the breath of life itself. He was thin and pale, a white mop of hair on top of his head. A head that lay cradled in his two palms. He looked down at the table staring into nothing. He neither looked up nor acknowledged my presence. My heart pounded in my chest as I stared at him, seeing all of him and feeling his pain so intensely that I almost choked on it. I backed out of the room silently, respectfully, feeling like I had seen something that was not intended for me.

This man from another time seems to follow me now. I wonder about his life, his wife, and his children. His son was dutiful in his responsibility to his father and I respect that. I am envious that I was never given the opportunity to do that for my own father. I wonder about the long term aspects of being a husband and a father as well. I’m in uncharted water. Most of the lessons that I’ve learned along the way I picked up my own; mostly through hard knocks and bad decisions. I didn’t have anyone to guide me or give me any of their wisdom. I don’t know what that looks like from an adults child’s perspective. I feel like I’ve gained a great deal of experience and knowledge over the course of my life. I’ve had some grand adventure and much heartache along the way but I don’t view those in a negative light. It’s the stuff that defines our character and dictates who we become.

Children are a grand experiment. You try and train them to be good people and do good things. The strange thing is you raise them when you have the least idea of what you’re doing and how the world turns. You do your best and hope it all works out. Then they run to the fore wind. You hope they call or come by. You hope they still want what you have but at the end of the day, they make their own choices and live their own lives. I fear that sadly, you live to be 94, head in hands in a big empty house wondering what the hell happened. If you’re lucky you have at least one that will take care of the phone bill and pick over your bones when you’re gone to throw out the shit you spent your life accumulating that really doesn’t add up to a hill of beans.

My father died when I was 13 years old. I still wonder what he would have made of my life. I wonder if I would want to hear what he had to say. Would we be close? Would I go out of my way to see him and talk to him? I like to think so. I like to hope we’ll catch up someday…when my run is done and all the things I’ve done and all things I cared about have turned to dust…

Remember I warned you.