When, even after my father’s prohibition of meals, I still would not come out, he must have
known he’d crossed a line with me that was larger than even he wanted to cross. Dad was
not, I should say here, a heartless man, just one very much used to getting his way. He was
used to not being questioned, and to not using many niceties in announcing and
implementing his decisions. He grew up in an era when being the father meant being the
“boss,” and he didn’t suffer gladly any signs of disloyalty.
It wasn’t easy for him, then, to come to my room, finally, and actually knock on my door—an
implied request for permission to enter. I could only guess that my mother must have worked
on him pretty hard.
“It’s Dad,” he announced, as if I didn’t know, and as if he didn’t know that I knew. “I’d like to
talk with you.” It was as close as he would ever come in his life to an apology to me for
anything.
“Okay,” I managed, and he came in.
We talked for a long time, him sitting on the side of the bed, me propped up against the
headboard. It was one of the best talks I ever had with my dad. He said that while he knew I
liked playing the piano, he hadn’t realized it meant so much to me. He said that all he was
trying to do was make space in the family room to put our couch along the wall, because we
were getting some new furniture for the living room. Then he said something I’ll never forget.
“We’ll get you a new piano, a spinet, which will be small enough for you to have up here, in
your bedroom.”
I was so excited I could hardly breathe. He said he’d start putting money aside, and that I’d
have the piano in no time.
I hugged my dad long and hard. He understood me. It was going to be all right.
I went downstairs for dinner.
Weeks passed and nothing happened. I thought, “Oh, he’s waiting for my birthday.”
September tenth arrived, and there was no piano. I said nothing. I thought, “He’s waiting ‘til
Christmas.”
As December approached, I began holding my breath. The anticipation was almost
unbearable. So was the incredible letdown when my spinet didn’t arrive.
More weeks went by, more months. I don’t know when it was, exactly, that I realized my
father was not going to keep his promise. I do know that it wasn’t until I was thirty that I
realized he probably never intended to.
I had just made a promise to my oldest daughter that I knew I wasn’t going to keep. It was to
stop her from crying. It was to put her out of some childhood misery that I now can’t
remember. I don’t even remember now what the promise was. I only remember saying
something to mollify her. It worked. She threw her little arms around me and cried, “You’re
the best Daddy in the whole wide world!”
And the sins of the father were visited upon the son...