The Sad Cowboy

"OK, my dad is a kind of a cowboy dude."

These words were written in a journal my son shared with me a few weeks ago. He had found it among his boxes of keepsakes somewhere. It was written when he was in the first grade.

Perhaps he wrote those words because I liked reading Louis L'Amour westerns - and he loved Hank the Cowdog books - especially when I read it to him in my cowboy drawl.

Or maybe he just thought I was cool, like a cowboy dude.

I was kinda cool.

I was the father who read bedtime stories in character voices. The one who played Barbies better than any cousin, better than any friend.

I coached so many baseball teams for the boys that I lost track. Little League, Pony League, and summer high school teams.

The huge murals that covered their bedroom walls were dad-painted. I was the pitcher, the catcher, and the goalie. The fort builder. The nature hike expert, snake hunter, and squirrel doctor.

And I was famous for being their favorite hapless one-man basketball opponent; while simultaneously announcing the games.

That's what I wanted their childhood memories to be - happy. Because I didn't want to be just a father. I wanted to be the father from whom they would learn happiness - laughter, fun, joy. That life was sweet. That it was a gift to be shared and treasured.

That it was meant to be lived together. And each of us would contribute to the happiness. 

When sadness entered our lives then, in 2012, it was sudden. It was a foreign thing to most of us, and an unsettling and uncertain future beckoned.

In the days ahead, my sadness grew with every new loss. With the deconstruction of each dream, each vision. I couldn't hide it, it was a cloak.

One rainy summer afternoon, I heard these words: "John, if you continue to be sad, you might as well place all of your unhappiness and heartache in a box. Wrap it up. Put a ribbon on it. Then give it to each of your children." And she was profoundly correct.

Because the sadness was erasing the happy moments of the past. All those moments that were so precious, swept away in a tsunami of bitterness.

Along the way, I was able to eventually dilute and erase sadness. Then find happiness again.

And what I've learned - and what I see with my own eyes every day - is that she was so right. That sadness can be unwittingly shared; an unwanted, sinister gift.

It's love in reverse. And it steals the past.

Now, I try to share my happiness. I remind them of our wonder years together and our shared, happy past.

And finally, I feel better. I feel like a cool dad again.

Almost like a cowboy dude. The one I was, all those years ago.

The Tears of our Angels

When she called me, she was crying.

I tried to make her feel better with my favorite saying with teenagers, "There's only one victim here, and it's not you. It's me."

Still, it was hard for her not to feel like a victim; like something had been lost - or stolen.

Like that night her teenager took the car.

On the phone; her voice was choked with sadness. She cried about the loss of sweetness, of innocence, of trust. The memories of that purity, the images of Barbie parties and dancing, of girls in their sleepover pajamas. Of the tender grasp of a tiny hand in hers ... they seemed like a painful loss.

They were the tears of an angel. And one day, for her teenage daughter, they'll matter; they'll have real meaning.

I know this rite of passage. It's so hard.

With my teens, there were so many of those moments. When I thought that the sweetness of youth was forever lost. That they had fled from the land of Belle and The Beast, of Harry and Hermione, to a place where belief in magic was forsaken for risk and thrill.

Pivotal, youthful epiphanies - when they began to believe it would be more fun to hitchhike than to sit in the middle seat of the minivan.

I remember a long-ago Christmas Eve when I found myself in a parking lot filled with the flashing lights of police cruisers and the teary eyes of my seventeen-year-old boy. Looking back, I think it was when I first learned that love was stronger than disappointment.

That it needed to be.

There are few days when I don't think about that night. I became a better man. I stood next to my wayward son, in front of the policemen. There was an unspoken understanding between us: we'll get through this - together. And we did.

In some ways, our moment that night, standing together among the flashing lights, was more powerful and meaningful than times of innocence and bliss shared in the many years before.

Before 16. Before 17.

And so, I've learned about the teenage soul. That sweetness and innocence aren't really lost. They're still there. In memories of baseball games and Pokemon cards, in memories of holding hands from the car seat.

In unconditional love, sometimes hidden, but always there.

I should tell her again. That she's not really a victim. She's an angel.

And she can fly.