Friday, November 17, 2006

Times

Thank you for the time we stood at the end of the garden in the dark and you showed me the stars, bending down to my level to point out Mars and the Big Dipper. The universe was very big and I was very small and I felt safe.

Thank you for the times you let me come outside in the cold and dark and watch you chopping the wood for the fire like Little Red Riding Hood and the woodcutter. You were very big and I was very small and I felt safe.

Thank you for the times when I was sick and you crept in with comics and chocolate and laid them on my bedside table. I was ill and I felt better.

Thank you for the nights and the early mornings talking in hushed voices in the lamplight, only the faint rustle of straw and the low breathing of a sick animal getting better, breath making clouds of steam. It was cold and I felt warm.

Thank you for when I stole the tennis balls and you didn’t get angry. You sat down and told me why it was wrong. We put them back and you bought me crisps. I was wrong and you made everything right.

Thank you for Christmas, for the songs and the tree and the laughs and the capers, for the walk we took just us two along the river, arm in arm. You had on your best coat. There wasn’t any snow but you made it Christmas.

Thank you for all the times I was tired and lonely and lost and you talked and you listened and you knew, and you made me laugh till I cried. I thought it was dark and you made the sun come up.

Thank you for the evenings you spent building our little farm with pieces of wood and glue and your penknife. Thank you for the mirror that was a pond and the cowshed and the green grass. Thank you for jumping over the couch and throwing me in the bath with my clothes on and soaking us all with the hosepipe. Life could have been so dull, you made it magic.

Thank you for tying my shoelaces when I was too small to know how. Thank you for tying my shoelaces when I was too pregnant to bend down and do it myself. It seemed impossible and you made it easy.

Thank you for Sunday morning walks when I wasn’t tall enough to reach your waist. Thank you for crabs and nippers, the best game ever invented. You could have kept that time for yourself, you gave it to me.

Thank you for all the times Dad. Forever and ever and always.
Thank you.

1 Comments:

Blogger Pippi said...

Bhuide, a beautiful letter of thanking.

4:41 pm  

Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

<< Home