After we finish off the last of the strawberry and rhubarb pie, we sing How Great Thou Art and the old Dutch father, he keeps us on tune.
We sing all four verses.
We close in prayer, the son surrounded by his sons and holding hands with his father.
I say Amen and He is and I clear the table. They wander outside.
I have stacks of dishes to do. More food to prepare for my own Dad and wife coming for the evening meal. From my post at the sink, I can see them on the back lawn out by the grove and in the orchard, the Farmer and his Father and a few of our freckled kids kicking around a soccer ball. The Sunday afternoon is still and full of greatness.
Our youngest kicker, the one with the bobbing gold ringlets, she’s five. The old Dutch Farming Father, the one with the Nederlands orange soccer jersey, he’s seventy-five. A lifetime spans them. The Farmer kicks to his father, his daughter.
I let the dishes soak and they are all ageless and kids and we never stop being children loving Father-love.
Levi kicks high. Shalom runs fast, curls flying. The Farmer and his father grin. And the Farmer passes to his father and his Father passes back and they run, young again and decades change little but the skin and the bending of bones and back and when the old Father is breathless, the son pauses and holds the ball in hand.
The old father takes off his shirt under the sun straight overhead. He takes off the orange shirt from the old country, his birth country, the one that gave him the thick accent and the strong legs and the name that begins with V. He stands bare and white and bellied.
He tells his son, “Here. You have this now.” And the father gives his son the shirt off his back, the one with the flag from whence he came. The Farmer puts on the orange.
I see the passing flame.
They pass the ball a little longer.
I wander back towards the house and my sink and, together, they walk to the edge of the fields to see how the crops grow this year. Through trees, I hear their laughter.
It is right on key.
:::
I am an always child, forever loving the Father-love ….. I keep counting the ways He loves:
#1678 – #1690
two fathers on Father’s Day
harmony
accents
orchards in June sun
generations
elderberry pie in the evening
my dad’s flannel shirts
Saturday night’s washed floors
farmers walking their rows, watching growth
hummed hymns
the empty stillness and full greatness of Sunday afternoons
How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God!
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How to begin your own 1000 Gift List ::: How Gratitude Can Change your Life
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Photos: Fathers and orange flames
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