My father visited us in the winter of 2017. I wrote this post shortly after he left.
The room is empty; bereft of his large pants hanging clumsily on my coat-closet-turned-bag-hanger, his iPhone perennially charging by his bed, his towel a massive rectangle across his two suitcases, the dresser piling up with gifts for mother and sister, a phone call and so many thousands of miles away. He is family; I am part of a family I created now; everything has changed; I am still his daughter, so nothing, really is altogether different.
He has come to my house now. I make his coffee every morning, his second cup by the time I wake up from a deep comatose sleep (my memory foam bed and the thought of him in the next room add extra layers of mental and physical comfort). On the third day, he is impatient, and after a crash course in microwave operation and the location of instant coffee, is able to make Bru at 5:30 am. I want to brew him cappuccinos but my mother insists on sending a filter with him. Only one cup, she insists, without sugar. I experiment, mixing heated whole milk with espresso, impatient for the water to gurgle through the filter and form that thick, strong, beloved decoction. For the longest time, I thought it was spelled with an ‘x’. Dicoxion. Much more exotic.
He is not particular. Serve him anything, hot, and he will eat without complaint. He dislikes the apple whiskey we chose for him. He knows how to click on ‘Accept Terms & Conditions’ and connect to Starbucks Wi-Fi and upload YouTube videos. He is a curious child bedazzled by his own curiosity. His countenance, so consumed by his work, disallows for active listening. He wants to know what the construction cranes outside our apartment do; why the Fraser river is so calm (and lazy?!). He asks me about my work, and is distracted before I can begin explaining.
I saw Disneyland on his shoulders. He carried me everywhere: Small Wonder, Space Mountain, Animal Kingdom. I would ride on his back, as he got on all fours, the world, my parents’ bedroom. And he was here now, for three weeks, being curious, drinking buttermilk, watching Godfather I, II, and III, taking down title cards, watching penguins bring food to their young, calling himself one. He filled up all the India emptiness with his pleasant smile, and repository of poetic wisdom.
He created me. I consider this. For the first five years of her life, he’s brazen enough to convince my sister the appendix scar on his stomach was where they’d cut him open when she was born. Every part of me once came from him, nuzzled in his tender care. I stare at the room; bereft of his two large coats; his belly big and generous like his heart. I cry for every second I will miss him, and have already missed him, all this while, creating my family. Is he also a traveler in my life now? Is his permanence only a background for the movement of my life, a guiding light, an arrow directing me onward? I try remembering his hair, length and color, the exact texture of his hands, his face as he rests, cuddling up in a cold still alien to him. How can he be so far already?
Leaving home sucks :(