In the courtyard of the Alcázar was a man with a painted face. He stood on a silver box and wore a silver helmet. He held a silver lance and shield with silver-painted fingers.
I saw him from behind, across the square and through the trees. In Spain, only one man carries a lance. Ian was holding my hand; I knelt and pointed. ‘Ian, look! It’s Don Quixote!’ We started walking toward him. I reached into my pocket for a coin, and handed it to Ian. ‘Here, hold this.’
Ian loves money—its presence, not its concept—and his eyes brightened. He also knows that Mommy and Daddy don’t often give it to him. His eyes narrowed. ‘Why?’
‘You’ll see.’
He was surrounded, unmoving, by a small crowd. They were in two semi-circles: the first with adults, the second with a shifting group of timid and smiling children. The children would inch forward and rush back, huddling against their parents’ legs, their eyes never leaving Don Quixote’s face.
A paper cup sat at his base. It was painted silver.
We stood in front of the motionless Man of La Mancha, and Ian caught the nervousness of the other children. He looked at me. Well? I pointed to the cup. ‘There. Put your money in there.’
I was asking him to surrender the coin which he’d had for only a minute, to throw it away in a paper cup. And I wasn’t explaining why. He looked up at Don Quixote, who winked. He may not have known what was happening, but even a four-year-old knows that statues don’t wink.
He dropped his coin in Don Quixote’s cup.
The knight-errant smiled. He bent his head toward Ian and reached down, slowly, his fingers waving in the air. He leaned forward. Ian put an arm around my leg and his feet shuffled backward. I put my hand on his back and gave him a gentle nudge.
Ian took a step, and another, as he watched the silver fingers glinting in the sun. He looked at me once more, to make sure I could explain to Mommy just why he had been eaten, and extended his arm toward certain doom.
Don Quixote took hold of Ian’s fingertips and waggled them back and forth. Ian grinned and turned toward me, mistakenly turning his back to the foe. He jumped when he felt the silvered fingers twirling in his hair, gently pulling strands here and there.
The knight stood, distracted by thoughts of Dulcinea del Toboso, and was still. Ian and I walked away, spots of silver shining in his hair.
First Grade Homework
By D. Nurkse
The child’s assignment:
‘What is a city?’
All dusk she sucks her pencil
while cars swish by
like ghosts, neighbors’ radios
forecast rain, high clouds,
diminishing winds: at last
she writes: ‘The city is everyone.’
Now it’s time
for math, borrowing and exchanging,
the long discipleship
to zero, the stranger,
the force that makes us
what we study: father and child,
writing in separate books,
infinite and alone.
This Sunday is Father’s Day, a fact which I completely forgot while I was sprinting my way from Terminal 1 to Terminal 3 at Heathrow. Cards are gonna be late this year, collective Dads!
Author and blogfather Tony Woodlief hasn’t forgotten, and somehow managed to artfully relate Paris Hilton to Father’s Day. Bravo.
‘It’s interesting that we celebrate the success of men at business, sports, entertainment, war, and politics, but rarely at the thing which matters more than those often-ephemeral feats, the raising up of confident, competent, moral, courageous children to carry on a free and prosperous civilization. Not to wrestle with this great calling every day of our lives, fathers, is to fail at manhood itself.’
Quiet! Very. Why no word for, gosh, over three weeks? Because we’ve been in Spain! Our family tries to fly across the pond every few years, and my Spanish-teacher wife had never been to Spain. Travesty!
We returned on Saturday night, with many stories, pictures, and no luggage. All of that’s coming soon, but at the moment I’m in no condition to do much more than drool. I will, however, leave you with one of the best memories of our trip.
We drove north from Nerja during our first week for an overnight jaunt to Seville. The evening we arrived was very stressful, for reasons I shan’t explain, save to say that I and my father-in-law did something very stupid, very avoidable, and could easily have ruined the entire trip. It didn’t, but we didn’t know that at the time.
We stayed in a hotel in Sanlucar la Mayor, a small town outside of Seville. We drove down the road, searching for tapas to ease our pain, and found a small courtyard surrounded by cafes and heladerias. In the middle of the courtyard was a playground covered by dozens of children. Ian was on a two-week trip to Spain with his parents and grandparents, and nary a friend in sight.
When we’d finished our Coke Lites and tuna specials, Ian ran to play. Evenings in Spain are soothing. As the light fades, everyone finds their way to the streets and cafes to talk and walk and relax.
We watched Ian from a distance as he did his best to join the fun. Kids don’t need a common language, but it helps when you’re playing tag. He found a group of boys with a ball, and went from there.
As we were leaving, Ian ran to Kelly. ‘Mommy! How do you say ‘goodbye’?’ Ian ran back to one of the boys, waving his hand high in the air. He stopped and shouted, ‘Adios!’
And that, friends, is my son.
