A Maundy Backyard Saturday

30 September, 1998 My once upon a time 180-pound father barely moved back and forth in my brother’s backyard hammock. He was all white and thin now at 126 pounds, skin and bones sticking out of his ladderback undershirt and old man plaid shorts. He likes to sit in the sun to warm his ill-circulated body. I hurried outside when he started struggling to get out. I thought his lack of strength might dump his 90 year old body on the ground. So I helped. He’s lousy at receiving help. He got over to a chair and started to put his socks and shoes on. I knelt down without a word and took his socks and started to put them over his toes and up his bony legs. Neither of us said anything, but we were doing the ritual of footwashing. It was so intimate, it was uneasy. He finally said, “Not even Dwight (my older brother who lives with him) has ever put my socks on for me.” Finished but still kneeling, I looked up at my father. “Dad, can I tell you something?” “Yes.” “Yesterday when we had the dinner with Uncle Wayne and Aunt Betty (a dinner with all Dave’s family to celebrate Dad’s 90th birthday), I noticed you didn’t say anything about my beard or my ponytail . . . and I want to thank you.” He kind of threw back his head and laughed weakly and then stopped and just looked at me. He got it. He was off balance. That almost never happens to him. He heard me.