A Father’s Kiss

Yesterday, my therapist told me that I shouldn’t take guardianship of James, my seventeen-year-old grandson, that I should protect my own interests. I went home and looked at tall, gangly James, and I knew I would be heartbroken if I sent him back, if I gave up on him in order to protect myself. Hadn’t this journey been about taking risks?

Today the February issue of The Sun arrives, and I feel a strong surge of energy. James asks to go to the video store, and, while he shops, I look through The Sun. I find a poem by my friend Chris Bursk, and my heart leaps. Reading it, I hear his voice and feel his friendship.

James and I dash home, where I sit out on the balcony and continue reading. K. A. Kern’s “BIRD” is beautiful and moving. I am also drawn to “The Empty House of My Brokenhearted Father,” by Poe Ballantine. I read Readers Write, the rest of the poems, and finally Sunbeams. I cannot find one word that I do not like. The wind is blowing and the clouds are wonderful — charcoal gray cumuli, streaked with sun.

I go for a walk and my conviction steadily grows. I know exactly what I will do upon arriving home, what phone calls I will make. I feel none of the ambivalence that has burdened me these last four years. I will take legal guardianship of James. He will have a home now. Suddenly, I feel that I’m home, too. And I think how home isn’t a place; it’s when you finally open your arms and accept your ragged life, claim it as a triumph.