The world through the eyes of an empathetic father

And so I read about the three-year-old girl. The one that died in her sleep after a tree fell on her house. On her bed. Her bedroom. The one place where a child is free and safe and hidden from monsters.

And then I saw the pictures. The destruction of a town, limbs torn from trees, houses cleared like a hand clears away spilled salt, families torn apart. The crying little girls, searching for answers where there were no answers. There weren’t even any questions. The destruction had been so total that no one could figure out what to ask.

And then I thought, “Shit, dude. Where are my kids?”

“I need a hug.”

Because this is what it’s like being a father. I relate to everything. Every child could be my child. Every horrible story could be my horrible story.

COULD BE, I keep telling myself.

But COULD BE always turns into LUCKY IT WASN’T.

There’s no way of explaining the knot in my stomach I get when I read these stories. Except to say that I’m glad those knots show up, because more than anything they remind me how much I love and how much I’m loved.

If they weren’t there, I’d be afraid I didn’t care anymore.

This was lovingly handwritten on April 28th, 2011