Somewhere Over the Rainbow

Saturday I found myself on a practically deserted beach with my ma, a couple from Fort Frances and a pair of families of four on the opposite side. The couple is touring Ontario while he recovers from heart surgery. "I'm worried," he says, " I might scare people with my scar." She loves to swim but only in the clearest water because she can't stand leeches and needs to be able to see everything in the water. After explaining this she runs into the surf and dives in exuberantly. As though watching his twenty year old bride he says "She loves the water. She's amazing." Then, pulled back to the current decade he adds, less whimsically but with more admiration "Her whole family is. Her Uncle just swam the English channel. This takes some determination as it's so polluted, you know, you have to vaseline your body to keep it from sticking. Her mother's in her nineties and could swim half this lake without a problem." Before we learned all of this, before we'd even exchanged a sentence, he had stopped to ask if we needed anything from the store. "I'm going to town to get her a snack. Do you ladies want anything?" Just the offer makes me happy and I am reminded that there's no such thing as a stranger.

But not even an hour later, watching one of the fathers from the other side of the beach playing with the four children, the happiness is eclipsed by jealousy. He is teaching them how to swim under the dock and find the air pockets. "Just remember," he says, "if anything happens when you're under there, and you get stuck, don't panic, go down to find the sand then straight up." I am suddenly twelve years old again and crippled with envy of friends whose fathers read to them or tell them stories before bed. Fathers who show them how to swim or fix their bikes. This father takes the kids rock climbing on our side of the beach and as they walk by us he is saying, "Maybe we should bring something to fight the sharks."
"Sharks?" the oldest girl says doubtfully.
"Oh, absolutely, you don't know what's going to be there. It's unexplored territory after all."

Sigh. Imaginative too. Why couldn't I have had a Dad like that? Instead my father can be socially awkward, withdrawn and indifferent and because of our different religious beliefs and values, our relationship has be difficult.

"Dad," the youngest boy says.
"Yeh?" 
"Your eyes are really red."
"Yeah, well, I was up really late last night."

Okay so he's a pothead. Still, it takes me ten minutes to convince myself that I have not been cheated by the fates. That, in fact, I didn't need a Dad to teach me to stay calm or read to me because I've been able to figure these things out for myself. Even after I do finally quell this irrational dissatisfaction with reason and a reality check I still find myself dwelling in all the imperfect moments of my life as a daughter rather than my father's sense of humour, and gentle and generous nature.

Today, while cooking dinner Ma called for my father and I to come and see the double rainbow. I grabbed my camera and was taking pictures when my father said, "What about at the dock? Could you get better shots from there?" And then, suddenly excited by the prospect, he ran towards the house calling, "Where are the car keys?" Within seconds we're in the car, gravel spinning and spitting beneath the tires and driving down to the water. The rainbow is already fading when we get there but I get a few good shots including a couple with my notoriously camera shy father.

Today I went rainbow chasing with my father. Take that Mr. Pothead dad.