ALT-3 Why the best Fathers Day Gifts Aren’t the most Expensive
I remember clearly the day Olivia and her entourage arrived. It was June 15th six years ago to be exact. The pretty young woman appeared at the apartment door next to mine just as I was leaving. Her arms were plumb full, her brow was creased and a gold key was clamped in her teeth. She was not holding up well under her burden. I could see that not only would she be unable to unlock her door but she would also have difficulty setting her bundle down unless she simply let it fall to the floor.
"Can I give you a hand?" I asked. She nodded being unable to speak. I attempted to takeher bundle but she shook her head no and rolled her eyes downward to her key indicating she would rather I opened her door. Awkwardly I took the wet key from her mouth then unlocked and pushed open her door.
She unloaded her bundle on the kitchen table that was oddly enough in the living room. "Thanks" she said. "Guess I tried to bring up more than I should have. I'm Olivia" and extended her hand.Shaking her hand I responded "I'm Jim...your next door neighbour. Don't you have anyone helping you? Surely you didn't move the furniture in by yourself.""No, my brother gave me a hand last night but he was in such a rush there was no time to arrange things. I'm as rushed today as he was yesterday" she laughed wryly."Do you have to get to work or something?""No I have the day off but I only have a babysitter until 2:00pm. I was kind of hoping to have the furniture in place and a good start on unpacking before I picked the kids up."Oh..." I stammered.
I felt disappointment sink in as I realized this pretty woman must be married not to mention that she had children. I loved my apartment. I had lots of privacy and it was quiet. That appeared to be about to change. I was thirty-five and still baching it. I had been in serious relationships before but they ended when children were brought up. I had never even dated a woman who had kids. Not ever! It was time for me to make my exit. I really had no good departing line. I wasn't about to tell a married woman to drop by sometime if she felt like it or if she needed something. As well I didn't want last minute desperate pleas to be a babysitter when one couldn't be found. Like a true cad I also didn't offer to assist her further with her move. I figured she had a husband for that. She warmly thanked me again for my help. Before the door closed behind me she was already moving things about.
As I walked down the hallway in my head I was already writing my notice to move. I didn't want to find my hallway turned into a playground or to be woken by shrill shrieks and screams. It's not that I didn't like children I just wasn't accustomed or climatized to them. These were my thoughts after meeting Olivia that day.
As it turned out I never tendered notice to move and I still live in apartment nineteen. Olivia still lives in apartment twenty with her two sons. I am not yet married but I am engaged. The day Olivia moved in not only was she a beautiful young woman she was also a widow. Her husband had passed away just twenty days before she moved into my building. At that time her sons, Joe and Thomas, were three and six years of age respectively.
While it would be a lie to say they never made any noise they were quiet children and well behaved. Olivia had done a wonderful job to date raising them as clearly her husband hadalso done while he was alive. He must have been a remarkable man. I have tried over the years to get Olivia to date someone seriously. She maintains three men in her life are enough for any woman. She isn't being strange when she says that. She isn't referencingher dead husband as the third man. Actually it is her referal to me.
The day I met Ollie (that's what I call her) and she told me she had kids I stopped viewing her as a sexual being. From that moment on I viewed her as a wife, that is someone else's, and a mother. Mothers and sex don't belong in the same sentence.
It wasn't long, only a few days in fact, that I learned Olivia was a widow. On June 19th four days after meeting Olivia I met her son Thomas. He was huddled on the top step of the stairs to our floor. His arms were wrapped around his knees, tears were streaming down his face and snot was running from his nose. His eyes were swollen and red so much so that when I saw him I was quite alarmed. I asked the little guy what was wrong and he sullenly told me to go away. I was inclined to. My first thought was what a little brat and my sedcond was why hadn't I got around to giving my notice.
Instead I gently asked him if he was upset with his mom. "'Course not" he sobbed. "Well if your not upset with her then how about I take you back to your apartment. Your mom is probably wondering where you are.""No! She already knows I'm here 'cause I'm not allowed to go anywhere without her knowing where I am.""Oh, I see" was all I said. I stood there awkwardly no longer sure what to say or do. Finally I told him I would just let his mother know I had seen him and that he was right where he said he would be. Crossly he told me he wished I would mind my own business because he didn't want his mother to know how sad he was today because she was already sad enough.
Uncertainly I sat on the step below him and looked into his little face. I told him I lived next door and that I met his mom four days ago when she was moving their stuff in. I asked him if they were all settled in. He told me he guessed so. He didn't really care. Why not I had asked. Bursting into a fresh wave of tears and sobs he said because nothing was the same and he didn't want to live here. He wished he could just go back home and have everything the same. In that moment I thought Olivia must be separated and getting a divorce because no move could cause this mass of tears. The boy on the step that day was Thomas.
It was one more reason I didn't want children. Who knew if a relationship was forever. People divorced all the time and it was an ultimate betrayal to children everywhere. I knew this from first hand experience. My parents were separated and I became a child of divorce. I saw it as a betrayal. I didn't trust relationships. I knew commitments weren't forever. It was why I never married.
It got really bad between my mom and dad. I had never read a poem about love that dissolved into into screams of anger and bitterness. Perhaps my parents should have read love poems. When my parents divorced I stayed with my mom and my dad moved away. When he left I told him I never wanted to see him again. I was thirteen. He tried to change my mind but I kept my resolve. After a few months my mother started to encourage me to give my father another chance. At first she had been gleeful that I didn't want anything to do with him but I guess a few months of single parenthood didn't agree with her and she was ready for a break.
When I finally agreed to see my dad fate intervened yet again. My dad arrived on our doorstep with new girlfriend in hand. As soon as I saw this replacement I stamped my feet and refused to come out of the house. Anyone would have thought I was three rather than thirteen. My mother didn't react much better than I. She let my father know how thoughtless his actions were but I don't recall the words being as polite. Once again I stated I never wanted to see my dad ever and my mother encouraged my freedom of choice.
I was a stubborn child and now I am somewhat of a pig headed man. I did see my father three times between the ages of fifteen and thirty. After that the point seemed moot. My dad married the woman from the doorstep that day as soon as his divorce from my mother was final. I took the position that he and I were divorced as well.
Now many years later sitting on a step with a broken hearted Thomas my own flood of pain reopened. I felt anger not towards his father at this moment but toward Olivia. I supose it was because I had met her and not Thomas' father. I needed something tangible to be angry at. She was tangible and closer. I contemplated words that might lend comfort to this six year old boy while wrestling the past demons suddenly set loose in me. Thomas suddenly plunged at me with little fists flying. He was screaming "Why did he die, why did he die?"
It took me a moment to grasp what those words meant. It hadn't been a betrayal afterall. It was simply life in one of it's crueler moments. I was so shocked I didn't stop Thomas' punches. I never even felt his little rain of blows. Once I comprehended it I found myself taking his little wrists, wrapping his arms around my neck and holding him close. "I'm so sorry Thomas. I didn't know." I held him and he cried himself out. When he was finally able to talk again he asked me if I knew today was Father's Day. I hadn't realized it. I guess because I hadn't celebrated it since I was thirteen years old. I never paid any attention to the ad reminders because I had no reason to be reminded. It had become a meaningless day to me as I considered myself fatherless and I was definitely childless. For Thomas' sake I simply said that yes, I knew that.
He pulled a crumpled homemade card from his pocket. "I made this for my dad" he said. I didn't know what to say. It didn't seem wise to encourage a child to make cards for a dead father.Finally I simply said "That's nice.""How would you know you didn't even see it." He had me there."Well may I see it?""Okay." He handed me the crumpled card made with yellow construction paper. Thomas had written in clumsy six year old printing "To My Dad, I luv you with all my hart. I miss you terbly. I made yor card yellow becuz it is you favrite. Plese come bak if you can. Yor sun Thomas."
My throat tightened when I read that card and saw the desperation in his eyes. I handed him back his card and took his little hand. "I think your dad would have really liked your cardThomas. I bet it is the nicest one anyone ever made for him.""Do you think so" Thomas asked me shyly."Yes, I do."
I asked him if he felt a little better. He nodded slowly and sadly. I pulled up on his hand to bring him to his feet and walked him to his door. It was opening as we came up to it. Olivia appeared and said "Oh, there you are..." I mumbled that Thomas and I had been sitting in the stairwell having a chat. "Oh" was all she said."Yes. He told me about his dad." Olivia didn't respond instead took Thomas' hand from mine. Her eyes welled with tears. I said "I'm sorry Olivia" and then rushed to my own door.
That was my introduction to Thomas. I still had the younger one to meet. Joe was three and I met him a few weeks later. Ollie was bringing the boys in. They had been to the park. Their cheeks were rosy from the fresh air. I was on my way out at the time. Olivia stopped to say hi and introduced her littlest man to me. After the introduction I then shook Thomas' hand and told him it was good to see him again. Where Thomas was more subdued Joe had the gift of life in his eyes. His eyes sparkled out mischief and he had a happy, healthy glow. Olivia herself looked energized and invigorated that day. She had her hair down and was wearing a lemon colored sundress. She looked natural, yet so incredible.
It's funny all the details I can recall when it comes to Ollie and her two boys. Over these six years I have come to know each of them as though I had known them my whole life. They are a wonderful little family. They are happy, spontaneous, and endearing. It was Ollie and her two sons that showed me what love, trust, and commitment really meant. I am so glad that I didn't follow my gut instinct and give notice to move. I never would have believed that a woman who was not my wife and her two children who were not my sons could have impacted my life the way they did.
It wasn't an overnight thing. It took time to let them into my life. One could say I became accustomed and climatized to them. Ollie is a special woman who loved her husband very deeply. She shared this love with her sons. She made sure they knew about their father and what what kind of a man he was. For this she has my utmost respect. Even though Ollie hasn't yet met someone else I don't believe she will remain on her own. She is still very beautiful and she has a true zest for life. She needed time to grieve and mourn her loss and she needed time to cherish her many good memories of the man she loved. She has done all that.
Ollie chose her husband carefully. She once told me that she credited her father with her choice of a husband. Her father had been a very kind and genuine person and this gave her a clear picture of what she wanted in a husband. It was after that conversation with her that I started spending more time with Ollie, Thomas, and Joe. Somehow I knew that I needed to learn from them how to be a good man and they could teach this to me because they knew what a good man was. When I watched the love this family shared I became aware of all the things I hadn't been sharing in and what I had been letting myself miss out on. Even though Ollie and I never dated each other and never intended to I somehow sensed that through her I would find love and I did. I found many kinds of love including the love of children.
I was invited to and went to as many of Thomas and Joe's school plays, sports days and events as I could. I go to all their birthday parties. Even now that I am engaged and ready to start a family of my own I will continue to do so. While Ollie's boys are not my own they taught me the qualities a father needed to have.
Today is June 19th six years later and it is once again Father's Day. At 4:05pm there was a knock on my door. It was Thomas. He had a bright gleam in his eye. He had his shirt all tucked in and his hair was tidy for a change. "Come on in Thomas" I told him. He stood in my living room switching his weight from leg to leg. I asked him what was up. "Well Sir..""Sir?" I interupted. "What's with the Sir?" I asked confused. Thomas blushed then and reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a card."This is for you.""What's the occassion" I asked."Don't you know what today is?" I was baffled. "Just read the card" he said.
I pulled the card from the envelope. The card was made of dark blue construction paper. In Thomas' now very neat and legible handwriting the card read "To Our Jim, Today is Father's Day. It is a very special day because I have had the blessings of two wonderful men in my life. The first, my own father who will always be in my heart. The second, my neighbour Jim who has been and continues to be ever present and the next closest thing. I made this card in blue because it is your favorite color. I love you Jim, Your neighbour and friend Thomas."
I actually cried. Thomas called me a wuss. While tecniqually I wasn't yet a father I felt like I was. Thomas gave me the greatest gift. He made me understand what being a father would entail and he also made me realize that if I, with all my imperfections, could one day be a father, I would try to the best of my ability to be a good and loving one. More than that Thomas showed me what a good son would be like. It is now 6:00pm. I am making a telephone call. It's ringing. "Hello...Dad. It's me Jim. Happy Father's Day..........."
