THIS IS US
My Father: A Timeline
I struggled to understand my father. Here’s what I do know about him.
There are some things you should understand about this man, the man who fathered me:
1957
He looks like almost every other baby ever born: red-faced, hairless, eyes closed. His cries pierce the quiet country desolation and scatter among the last brittle oak leaves of winter. Spring is coming.
1968
Middle child syndrome. Somewhere among the cows and the chickens, the last of the hogs and two stray dogs. Not as pious as the eldest, a daughter, nor as charming as the youngest, another son. Poor eyesight and a buzz cut. Nothing special, really.
1973
Pulls a knife on the kid at school who had taunted him for his thick horn-rimmed glasses. Two weeks later, drops out of high school, having almost completed 10th grade.
1977
Marries my mother. Soon, she is pregnant but miscarries. That (boy, girl?) would have been my older sibling, the one to lead the way through childhood. Sometimes I envy that early departure.
