I gazed nostalgically at the tall, bushy pines on the hill that runs up from the freeway to the road that intersects the street I grew up on. As we drove by, I explained to my companion that when my parents first moved there twenty-eight years ago, those pines weren't there, rather it was a barren expanse of tall grass. When I was maybe about seven, I said, my dad climbed through a break in the chain-link fence which served to keep out the riffraff. He took with him some young pine trees, and a shovel.
Those trees now served to remind of something, though I never really knew what. Often when I drive that road headed for the most familiar place I know, I admire the now tall pines and think of the mark my father has unknowingly left on something formerly drab and uninteresting. He unknowingly built me a memory, in planting those trees, and revealed a part of his heart that I hadn't fully understood for years.
Although he does have a thing for landscaping, my dad isn't exactly what you'd call a tree hugger. I even remember asking him about the pines when I was a teenager, because frankly, I'd always thought it was a little peculiar. Why go to the trouble of illegally planting trees on the side of the freeway, at least a football field's length from our home? He responded, so matter-of-fact, that that space needed something and he thought they would look nice. That answer not only surprised me, but it never quite felt sufficient.
Recently, a neighbor who lives behind my parents went rogue, conquering their eight-foot privacy fence by ladder on either side to cut down some trees in their yard that he didn't like. Naturally this sparked conversation when my parents told me. Now, my father doesn't always seem like the most emotional person, but under a certain protective layer of toughness - which I can't rightly call a 'facade' - he is one of the most sentimental people you'd ever meet. After decades on this earth with him, I still learn new things all the time. He is a man of greater depth than he lets on, or perhaps even knows for himself. He told my mom and me a story that I found enlightening as to why he planted the pines all those years ago.
His mother had lived in the same house for many years, possibly the house he grew up in, I honestly don't know. His dad wasn't around a lot growing up, traveling often for work, so my grandma, Sally, was quite a tough little lady, by the sounds of it. I can tell by the way dad talks about her that he had a great deal of respect for her, but was also quite protective of her, as her only son. He told us how upon a return visit to his family home - some time after his dad had passed away - he was grieved to find that his uncle had convinced his mother (in some strange Canadian obsession with empty yards) to rip out the great trees that had lined the back edge of her lot for many years. Even as he gave the account, the disappointment resonated in his tone.
He recounted that one day after school when he was young, probably about middle-school-age, his dad had called him out to the yard behind their humble rambler. There my Grandpa Joe was with a shovel and several young trees, ready to be planted. Eager to help and likely hungry for any smidgen of quality time, my dad ran over and started away at digging in his new little league uniform. His dad quickly scolded him for working in his white uniform (here my mom noted he still does yardwork in nice clothes) and told him to go inside to change. He did, and the two planted what would grow into tall, beautiful overseers of Granny Sally's little abode.
My heart rose and fell within the span of that story. My dad doesn't often let on to such offenses having wounded him, but with the right attention the mysteries of his quirks unfold. As he explained the beginning and end of those trees in his yard, I understood him a little bit more than I had before. Those pines will now hold a different meaning for me; a new sentiment.
These are the moments I love; my dad is full of stories, and many of them seem to reveal things about him that I never knew were hidden beneath the surface. Many of these tales are tied to behaviors that have always been perplexing or curious. Many give a peek at the impressionable heart which drives him.
Now I just eagerly await the story that solves the mystery of his affinity for fake flowers...
