LA Times
My dad moved to San Diego when I was 12. My siblings and I usually saw him a few times a year after that. We would fly out for a few weeks in the summer and during school breaks, and he would come visit us in the fall, his favorite time in New England. I loved visiting San Diego during February vacation week. It was the perfect time to get out of the New Hampshire winter when snow had become gray and more like crunched ice.
Visiting my dad was always a bit of an adventure. He wasn’t a daily life parent, he was a destination. The precious commodity of daily living was as much of a treasure as the places we explored in southern California.
I remember the first time I flew into San Diego; as we approached the runway, the tiny palm trees grew more real, the Pacific Ocean stretched on as far as I could see, and the stucco homes lined the streets of neighborhoods like a scene out of ET. Top Gun was one of the most popular movies that year and I thought if I looked hard enough, I might catch a glimpse of Maverick flying his MiG-28 out in the distance at Miramar Naval Air Station.
During the first few visits after he moved to San Diego, he excitedly took us to the obligatory tourist sites; the San Diego Zoo, favorite beaches, Sea World. The first time my little sister Caily joined us for the journey she was five. So we embarked on the most exciting adventure we imagined to exist - Disneyland. As we left the infamous theme park at about 1AM, exhausted and dragging, Caily was bouncing along like Tigger and exclaimed, “I thought we were going to go on ALLLL the rides!!!!” We thought we might collapse, and she finally did, on my lap in the car on the two-hour drive home.
On another visit to LA, the destination was Hollywood. We drove through neighborhoods of the rich and famous and stopped for a picnic in a park in a fancy part of town. As we were eating our lunch on a blanket, a white limo pulled up. Two men, each in white tuxes, stepped out with another man holding a very professional camera. My step-mother was very excited at the prospect of seeing a wedding or at the very least, a wedding photo shoot. She kept saying “I wonder where the bride is.”
At some point, the men were close enough to our blanket for my step-mother to strike up a conversation. She asked “which one of you is getting married?”, looking around for the bride. They replied “we both are.” She said “where are the brides?” They replied, “WE are getting married,” gesturing their hands toward each other.
“OH, ohhh, oh. Wow, wonderful.” She replied. “Congratulations” and we walked back to our blanket. “Huh,” my 15-year-old brain thought, “that’s cool.” I remember realizing for the first time that same gender couples could get married. I didn’t have any awareness of the legal, logistical, or cultural struggles at the time. I know that I knew what being gay meant, but I had never consciously seen a gay couple. I followed the cues of my parents who were demonstrating kindness, and congratulating the couple as they would have a bride and groom, or woman and man. Looking back, I can see it sent a message of acceptance, non-judgment, and normalization. I am grateful for that imprint.
As a teenager in the early 90’s from a little city in New England, spending time in southern California was equivalent to traveling to a different country. There was always something new that felt like a grand adventure - new places, cultures, people, languages. The exposure outside of my relatively homogeneous life at the time broadened my world and created meaningful memories, some with my father’s intention, and many just by chance.
Our relationship was squeezed into visits with time limits and it sometimes feels as though there is an inverse relationship between the dose of the experience, and the depth of the memory.
Precious moments of daily life while visiting him, though so infrequent, are implanted into this fabric of novelty that held our relationship during my adolescence. I remember him when I wipe a tear from my eye with the side of my finger like he did, when I get a whiff of a burning cigarette, when I see the sun set on the Pacific Ocean. I remember him when I eat a mushroom pizza, when Lauren eats meatballs and when Liam eats chicken wings. I remember him when I make coffee, when college basketball is on TV, when I hear the bounce of a tennis ball.
When someone we love dies we are left with what was created with them, and what they may have created for us in the case of a parent. We are left with how they interacted with the world, and what we observed of that interaction; precious commodities that were unknowingly purchased and stored away to be retrieved by our future self - a return on the investment of love and presence, no matter how limited the time.