When
he did come home, he would grab the newspaper, head straight to the bathroom,
change clothes, and then shut himself in there for hours until dinner was
ready. He claimed that it was his
decompression time, where he finally got to relax and de-stress from the
day. My brother and I were told to leave
him alone while he was in there, which we obediently complied with…for 5-10
minutes. Then, one of us would sneak up
to the bathroom door and tap on it. We
were greeted with a sigh and a resigned, “Yes?”
Taking this as an invitation, we would excitedly launch into whatever it
was that we wanted to share with our father.
Sometimes,
it was as simple as wanting to show him our latest report card or artwork. Sometimes, especially as we got older, it was
wanting to ask for the sports page out of the newspaper. It was not uncommon for the conversation to
be initiated simply by sliding something under the door to him. We’d push it halfway and wait. If we saw it disappear, then we knew we had
our opening.
Other
times, we wanted to ask for his opinion on something or to relate a story about
our day. He would never open the door,
so we’re not for certain that he was actually listening to us. He could have just been reading the newspaper
the whole time. But that didn’t matter
to us. We would prattle on happily in
our ignorance.
When
I think back, almost all of my entire childhood interactions with my father
were through a door. I don’t remember
having much time with him in person. I
have scattered memories here and there.
But I remember our interactions through the bathroom door. It’s a strange way to grow up, and I guess
psychologically speaking, we were looking for more of a relationship with our
father. We craved his attention and
time, which was sparse and not freely given.
So, children being resilient like they are, we improvised and
interjected ourselves into his life wherever and however we could.
