Circle

My father painted western landscapes and bluebonnets in a manner that can be described as “primitive.” He painted with his heart to stay sane in the never-sane world of the mens’ tubercular sanitarium. From what little I actually know of him he was a man of conscience and strength and love for his family. He may have been other things too, but I can’t possibly know for certain except from the stories I’ve been told. In these stories he was almost a saint. When I was twelve he was sent home to die, although no one told me. I remember him lying in bed in our front room. I touched his puffy leg, leaving a white dimple. We laughed. He said we would make plans for time together, just the family, when he was better. One anonymous night I stayed with my grandmother for no reason I could figure out, although I really didn’t give it much thought. In the darkest part of that night my mother woke me to tell me he was dead. I don’t remember my reaction, but I don’t think I cried. Men didn’t do that, you see. I do remember eating cake after his funeral at what I recently heard called a “funeral party.” I have a way of forgetting painful times. For a long time after his death my memory is a blank. Now, I am a painter. I don’t paint his landscapes or bluebonnets, but, like my father, it brings a breath of sanity to my world, completing the long-delayed circle of his life.