If My Father Were Here - Cindy Rasicot

If my father were here he would be sitting in his favorite black lazy boy chair reading the newspaper. But he died thirty four years ago of cancer, so it’s hard to imagine him still with us. I remember as a small child waiting for him to get home from work, waiting for the rumble of the car engine to pull in the driveway. After he got home, the evening news would go on, Douglas Edwards, CBS news. Then my mom would make dinner, sometimes fried chicken, sometimes, tongue, sometimes liver and onions. There was always meat in the mix. We would all sit down at the kitchen table with the wooden benches. The table cloth with the small strawberries on it was my favorite. My brother and my sister and I would ask to watch T.V. but that wasn’t allowed in the evenings. We could watch Disneyland on Sundays, and that was the one program. We really looked forward to that.

I don’t remember my father saying much to us in the evening. He buried his nose in a newspaper or a book. My mom served him a bagel and a cup of coffee after dinner. Dad was more like a fixture than a person to talk to. That was okay with me. In a funny way, in his quiet chair I knew him the best of anyone in our family. We had a closeness, even in the quiet silence we shared.