Daddy takes a Break for a Story

STA60001, originally uploaded by dustkunkel.

I haven't written much on our site about what work is like for me these days. Now that the "taught" portion of classes are officially over, and I've turned in my last major paper, all that's left is the 20,000 word dissertation. . . . yeah, all that's left!

Janette goes to work and Lily goes to school and Zoe, well, Zoe stays home with Daddy. Nursery is done now, and Zoe actually stayed home for the last three weeks too. Partly because we travelled a bit, and partly because nursery fees were a bit steep.

So Zoe stays home with dad and does her own work and play. Every now and then, there'll be a little monkey climbing on my back begging for a story or a "buckin' bronco" ride.

And Dad stops writing about the hermeneutic process as an interpretational tool for listening to the stories young adults tell about their motivations for being summer camp staff and picks up "Where the Wild Things Are."

We read and talk and, if its a "good day," Dad gets a few more hours of study without interruption. Its just a fact of life, that dad's have to sometimes get things done, and they have to say "no, I can't do that right now." But for me, that isn't easy to do.

The other day, we were reading a picture book about Jesus and Zacheaus. We took our time -- really took our time and looked at the pictures and wondered what the people were thinking.

"What is Jesus thinking?" I would ask pointing to him walking in the crowd.

"What is he thinking?" Zoe asked, pointing to the little man climbing the tree.

"Good question, hon'." . . . . . . what IS he thinking?

I was the little man in the tree, I was the little man wishing and hoping for just a sight. Not a conversation, just a glimpse of compassion. I knew all the people in the crowd below, knew all their dirt. And they knew mine too. What a distance between us all. Like galaxies staring at one another through the wrong end of a telescope.

And he walks up and stops and looks right at me. And he wants to come to my house and eat dinner! I am the little man in the sycamore tree, I feel the smooth, peeled bark under my hands and the wind pushing through the leaves and I am really, really there stuck in that tree.

"Zacheaus, come down. I'm going to your house today."

"Daddy, why are you crying?"

"I don't know."

"Are you sad?"

"No, I'm not sad."

"But you have tears," she says, and touches my cheek.

"I guess they're happy tears."

"What are happy tears?"

"They come out of you when your heart is really full of happiness and you can't help it, so you cry."

"Daddy. . . . are you okay?"

"Yeah. I'm okay. I'm more than okay."

Sometimes its the little stories, the ones we learned as kids, that come back to haunt. A tree, a crowd, a little man, a daddy and his little girl. And Jesus. Always Jesus.