seeing

i keep thinking about him.

i called him last nite. it'd been awhile.
i hadn't even talked to him about bein' engaged to his
nephew. he had heard, but i had yet to squeal in person.

so i checked in.
he was in a great mood.
one of the best i've ever heard.
we laughed a lot.

we talked of being 'official' family.
he told me i'd be his favorite family member and
he thanked me for accepting the marriage proposal.
i laughed. 'my pleasure!' i said.

we started laughing about when we first met.
he tells the story often.
he gets his voice in that certain tone and says
'when you hugged me like that, i just thought you
were a pick pocket.'

i've heard it before, and i've laughed before.
but last nite i asked 'did you REALLY think that??'

he said it went right thru his mind.

i asked 'did you check your wallet after we hugged?'

and you know what???

HE DID!

oh we laughed.
hard.
i haven't laughed that hard over it before.
but we were just feeling good and laughin' extra hard.
it was wonderful.

he told me how ashamed he was later.
but how no one had ever done that before to him.

hug him???

well....a stranger hug him like that, he said.

and then he told me again how he wasn't raised with
any affection.

then he said later i had told him that i 'wanted to hug the world'
and he understood that i was only acting from good intentions.

wow.
i can't even imagine being suspicious of a hug from me.
i mean, really. it's me.

but it says so much about where he's been.
and we talked of that.

and somewhere along the line, i asked him about how he saw himself.
did he see the good heart, the really smart mind?

no. he didn't see.

so we talked of that.
i told him i understood about baggage and all that,
but that we needed to look at what was really there.
i talked about how clear and sharp his mind was. how he
knew SO much and was so smart.

and then i asked him how he figures he came out of what he
came out of with a good heart. where did he think that came
from?

he hadn't ever thought of it before.

'homework,' i told him.

'when you get ready to go to sleep tonite, why not think about
who you really are?'

i just called and left a message on his machine.
reminding him of his homework.
reminding him of his smarts and his good heart.

he's eighty years old. (at least) and he doesn't really see himself.
ohmygosh.

we are the weirdest creatures, aren't we?
why is it so hard for us to see?

i'm starting to see. and now i'm like a born again see-er!
we all need to look! i want to go to everyone i see, grab them
and say 'have you seen???'

laughing....that's prolly not real helpful.

but i can't get him off my mind this morning......
and i'm just so glad we had the conversation we did.

every little bit has got to help.