I kept my hands on the edge of the table.<\/p>\n
The box remained open in front of me.<\/p>\n
The shoes sat beside it, and my father's envelope rested where I had placed it.<\/p>\n
For a while, I simply looked at them.<\/p>\n
I had spent so much of the evening trying to understand what everything meant that I had nearly forgotten the difference between looking and interpreting.<\/p>\n
I wanted to do the first without rushing into the second.<\/p>\n
That sounded simple.<\/p>\n
It wasn't.<\/p>\n
Every time I looked at the shoes, I remembered how surprised I had been to discover my size.<\/p>\n
Every time I looked at the envelope, I remembered the feeling of recognizing my father's handwriting.<\/p>\n
Neither object had changed.<\/p>\n
I had.<\/p>\n
At least, I was beginning to see things differently.<\/p>\n
Marcus remained across from me.<\/p>\n
He had brought the box because my father had wanted him to deliver it.<\/p>\n
That was what I knew.<\/p>\n
I didn't know how the decision had been made, and Marcus had not claimed to know more than he did.<\/p>\n
I had to respect that.<\/p>\n
For years, I had wanted someone to explain my father to me.<\/p>\n
I had hoped that if I asked the right question, someone would finally give me the answer I needed.<\/p>\n
But people could only tell me what they knew.<\/p>\n
They couldn't fill every gap in my memories.<\/p>\n
I looked at the envelope again.<\/p>\n
My name was still there.<\/p>\n
Daniel.<\/p>\n
I had read the letter inside, but the sight of the envelope continued to affect me.<\/p>\n
It was one thing to remember my father speaking.<\/p>\n
It was another to hold something he had prepared specifically for me.<\/p>\n
I couldn't ask him why he had written it.<\/p>\n
I couldn't ask whether he had considered giving it to me while he was alive.<\/p>\n
I couldn't ask whether he had known how I would feel when I opened it.<\/p>\n
Those questions belonged to a conversation I could no longer have.<\/p>\n
I had to accept that, even though I didn't like it.<\/p>\n
I moved the envelope a little farther from the box so it wouldn't be covered by the packing paper.<\/p>\n
Then I rested my hands on the table again.<\/p>\n
I wasn't ready to make any decisions about the letter.<\/p>\n
I wasn't ready to decide what the shoes represented, either.<\/p>\n
For once, I allowed myself to leave both questions open.<\/p>\n
Marcus glanced at me.<\/p>\n
"How are you doing?"<\/p>\n
I considered the question.<\/p>\n
"I'm still trying to make sense of it."<\/p>\n
He nodded.<\/p>\n
He didn't tell me that everything would become clear.<\/p>\n
I was glad he didn't.<\/p>\n
I had heard enough reassuring words in my life that turned out to promise more than anyone could deliver.<\/p>\n
I didn't need another promise.<\/p>\n
I needed the freedom to admit that I didn't understand.<\/p>\n
The kitchen was quiet.<\/p>\n
I could hear the faint sound of the clock, but I didn't look at it.<\/p>\n
I had stopped measuring the evening by how long I had been sitting there.<\/p>\n
There was no deadline for understanding my father.<\/p>\n
I had spent years wishing he would explain himself.<\/p>\n
Now I had something he had left behind, and I was learning that receiving an explanation was not the same as knowing what to do with it.<\/p>\n
I could read his words.<\/p>\n
I could examine the things he had chosen.<\/p>\n
I could remember the man I had known.<\/p>\n
But I couldn't force those pieces to form a complete picture just because I wanted one.<\/p>\n
That was difficult to admit.<\/p>\n
It was also true.<\/p>\n
I looked down at the shoes.<\/p>\n
They were still plain black work shoes.<\/p>\n
They were still my size.<\/p>\n
I didn't need to add anything to those facts.<\/p>\n
Whatever my father had intended, he had selected them and left them for me.<\/p>\n
I could acknowledge that without deciding what it proved about our relationship.<\/p>\n
I picked up the envelope carefully and checked that the letter remained inside.<\/p>\n
Then I put it back on the table.<\/p>\n
I didn't open it again.<\/p>\n
I had already read it, and I didn't want to turn the act of rereading into another way to avoid the uncertainty I felt.<\/p>\n
I had done that before with memories.<\/p>\n
I would return to an old conversation and search for a word I had missed.<\/p>\n
I would replay a disagreement and imagine how it might have gone differently.<\/p>\n
I would tell myself that if I thought about it long enough, I could finally understand what the other person had meant.<\/p>\n
Sometimes reflection helped.<\/p>\n
Sometimes it only kept me in the same place.<\/p>\n
I didn't want the box to become another place where I stayed trapped.<\/p>\n
I wanted to learn what I could.<\/p>\n
I wanted to be honest about what I couldn't.<\/p>\n
And I wanted to stop punishing myself for not having answers that were no longer available.<\/p>\n
Marcus shifted slightly in his chair.<\/p>\n
I looked at him and gave a small nod.<\/p>\n
He didn't need to say anything.<\/p>\n
I turned back to the box.<\/p>\n
There was still more to examine, but I didn't need to pretend that the remaining contents would settle every question.<\/p>\n
I could continue without knowing what I would feel next.<\/p>\n
For the first time that evening, that seemed possible.<\/p>\n
I kept my hands on the edge of the table. The box remained open in front of me. The shoes sat beside it, and my father's envelope rested where I … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39831,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39844","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-insightdrama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39844","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39844"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39844\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39864,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39844\/revisions\/39864"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/39831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39844"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39844"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39844"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}