DEAR MOM AND DAD
0DEAR MOM AND DAD
By John Tuft
On the morning of November 25, 1954, your ten-pound creation of a rookie human perishable entered the world in the city of Beaver Falls, PA. As I approach the end of my seventh decade in the world I thought you might like a story of the view through these eyes and this heart. I have questions, lots of questions that will probably never be answered but that seems to be the status quo on this planet. Am I a space invader? Are we all aliens here on earth? The older I get the less I think about the rules and laws and beliefs that you taught and more about the people that you are. I would say were but as long as I have memories you are. I pray that the same may be true of myself. As you both know I created some rookie human perishables of my own. But they have to tell their own stories. And they are free to share them in any way that they choose. I hope that they are kind and forgiving.
Mom and Dad, I string words together. That seems to be my singular gift and passion. Sort of like I am doing right now in this letter. I have no idea how to post it to you so I’m posting it here in the hopes that it will reach you. Dad, you have passions that you don’t seem to know what to do with or how to express. In that, we are brothers. I struggle not to be imprisoned by my own. Mom, you have dreams that fill you with a quiet desperate longing. In that we are sisters. Yours filled you with dignity. I am a pilgrim on that pathway. I’m not certain I know how to measure any progress. The guardrails that you set for yourself in your journeys are ones that I can no longer claim as my own. The little, young rookie human perishable that you created first tried to navigate the waters he found himself in by staying quiet, watching, frightened even by his own shyness. Utterly fearful to offend or be caught in the spotlight of attention of any sort, but most of all humiliation.
For the most part, that seems to have gone the way of the flivver for me. Yet the shadow of that little boy lingers deep within me, Mom and Dad. As I write this little note I am listening to the music of Taylor Swift and The National. I walk around singing random lyrics of theirs plus many more. Dad, you muttered hymns in church and Mom, you had a very sweet voice. I think I fall somewhere in between. Ask your grandrookies, they can tell you much more about that and many other apocryphal at best, stories of the kind of father I turned out to be. They are grown up in years now, fully functioning adult beings to their own credit. I am fearful as to what they think of me as a man. Did the two of you ever wonder about such things?
Dad, every month I would find you at your desk or the dining room table with bills spread before you and a neatly scripted ledger at your elbow. You sweated every penny. But only after you set aside ten per cent of untouchable lucre. Money that was not for us. Coinage that could not be used for food and heat. Or clothes and shoes. A penny of every dime of allowance that was to be placed in the Sunday School collection basket. Some sort of toll, I often wondered. The turnpike of grace. So that God wouldn’t be angry with a little boy for cheating Him out of …candy for Himself? Mom, you had to get permission from your husband to go to work at Star Bakery. The joy that job gave to you is etched into me like the casual yet magnificent swirls waves leave in immovable rocks. Bringing home your pay envelope and sitting at the kitchen table. Money that belonged to you because it was earned by your labors. Carefully divided into little white envelopes where you wanted it to be.
Dear Mom and Dad, money and I simply do not get along. Enough said.
Dad, you taught me how to drive and how to forgive. Everyone except myself. We have that in common. Mom, you taught me how to cook and how to be humble. I know that you often cried in private. I wish that I could collect those tears and return them to you as precious jewels. But their very abundance speaks for itself. That is the stringer-of-words coming out in me. For that is all I have. There is so much more to say. My stories are for you. My faults are but mine own. Be gentle with yourselves wherever you may be. In love and hope, your son, John.
Words are magic and writers are wizards.0
