Arlington: Going the Distance
Dear Readers, I’m so glad you’re here! We’re just past Memorial Day, with Father’s Day ahead. Drabble Magazine published the first version of this piece several years ago, and it never fails to find a new iteration — maybe it’s the mix of emotions it stirs in me, it wants to be told in a new slant each time. I hope you enjoy my work. I invite you to return with a subscription to my newsletter. Thanks so much!
Arlington: Going the Distance
Several rows of white folding chairs glisten under the August sun, holding all who remain of Dad's East Coast colleagues and family. “Don’t come to California.” Mom had called me with word of his death after a long history of heart disease. She preferred I not come to his funeral. “See you in Arlington,” she instructed, and I didn’t protest.
I gave you every opportunity, my adoptive Air Force father reflected in dismay ages ago. Our history of estrangement is entwined with frequent separations, expectations, and disappointments. We’d long been uneasy, and apart from the brief conversation, there was little for me to say — never to confide. There could be no secrets, so in the absence of his trust, I lied. Yet, our lives were enmeshed in the secrecy surrounding adoption and his top-secret career. Weighing these recollections against my need for acceptance, my sensitivity, and my rebelliousness, I’m reminded of their childless marriage, for which I was all but powerless to compensate.
In 1975, when he sold our family home in New Jersey to embark on a post-retirement government career, my heart was again broken by abandonment; my adoptee losses compounded anew. In the suburban parish where he served as a permanent deacon, he and Mom were loved and admired. After the funeral mass, Mom followed him to Arlington, as she had from their teenage years in Manhattan, down the decades during his military service. Courageous, she is now bereaved. I’m fatherless at forty-eight, here to support her at his graveside. I’ll go the distance for her; for their love, and care for her. I’ll see that she rests beside him according to their plan — may that time be long in coming.
Six white horses draw the caisson carrying his flag-draped casket. Three artillery shots fire the salute, returning me to the present. My tears for lost affection, regret, and forgiveness don’t flow — for now.
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Synchronicity of thought up against how linear times spells out our future for us at every given turn we take, happens to me so often, I wonder if non-specific ESP might really be a thing, as I have had this affliction since childhood! I had just been ruminating over how Father’s Day was coming up in a week, then coming back around to my own life of not being a mother, I had begun wondering about men without children, musing both that I had never thought about this in my life before, and wondering if I had ever known any! Funny how the mind plays games on us when we’re getting older … of course I’ve known men who have never had children. Haven’t I? I might have to get back to you on that!