Hive Ave Fall2024 - Flipbook - Page 43
Hive Avenue Literary Journal
Non-Fiction
A memory I will share: My father and I were eating dinner
when out of nowhere he tells me that he used to have a radish
garden as a child.
He went back to his plate of food and said nothing more
of it.
I like to imagine my father little, maybe six or seven, in the
back of his suburban Michigan home. His face is mine—same
big head, wide nose, smirk. He’s visiting that radish garden after
school. Perhaps, it’s his one solace of silence away from his 昀椀ve
brothers and sisters. His mother is o昀昀 working or on a date or
maybe she’s singing on a windchime lined porch. Perhaps he can
hear her. His 昀椀ngers dig in the dirt for the root vegetable. He
thinks of nothing or of the drawings he’ll do later or maybe of
space or Elvis or Susie down the street.
Nothing bad, nothing that can hurt him.
I like to imagine him happy here.
*
*
*
The Wagon Wheel’s Mustang Flea Market shut down for
good during covid. I drive by it on my way to my parent’s house
every time they ask for my son to sleep over. An overgrown
empty lot now that will inevitably become a slumlord mega
complex.
I still remember how happy I felt as I held Black Lady in my
hands. We walked together back out towards the car lot. The
day was hot, I still don’t know how the vegetable vendors managed in the summer heat.
Before leaving, I talked my father into buying me a hot
dog and we ate by the bayou that always smelled like dead crawdaddy’s. On his lap, I thumbed his gold chained neckless that
was once his father’s. It will one day become mine and then my
son’s. On one side is the head of a man that I once thought was
my grandpa and on the other side is a Pegasus.
We sat in silence at the wood rotted table having already
exhausted conversation hours earlier. I ate slow, stealing each
moment with him. Our next father-daughter date wouldn’t be
for another week or month or sooner, maybe, if his golf game
got cancelled or if my mother was out of town.
His watery eyes drifted elsewhere. Mine do that too, sometimes wandering inside myself to be alone at the playground or
on the couch with my son, I too can grow silent. I know he loves
me, but it is hard to always climb and climb and climb.
My father’s favorite color isn’t a color but rather a shade
of grey. His favorite movie is The Godfather and The Sound of
Music. His favorite starch is rice, and his happy place is with my
mom or watching Dr. Phil in his backyard.
When I 昀椀nished eating, we stood up to head to the car.
Gathered the piles of plastic bags we’d accumulated throughout the day. It’s big red letters that said, THANK YOU THANK YOU
THANK YOU.
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