Write a Letter

Written in response to a prompt titled "Write a Letter" on July 30, 2002.

It's an interesting letter, one of apology of sorts with an invisible campaign that isn't as transparent as I thought it was when I first wrote the letter. There's a neediness and a selfishness I detect in the letter; but there are also great flashes of insight. What is most interesting to me is simply that my father, a man who did not keep "things," kept the letter.

Did he know that letter would find its way back to me? Did he know that letter would be my chance to go beyond the jokes and laughter to say things that mattered to me in a serious way? Did he know that I would know that he understood my letter as a way to say "Thank You" and that his keeping of the letter was his way of saying "You are most welcome!" Did he know that this very week I would be missing him particularly and need to remember writing that letter?