TODAY’S CROSSWORD

ACROSS 1 Discern 5 Way up there 9 Hot rum mixture 13 Nonsense poet

Edward — 14 Yeah (hyph.) 16 Raise one’s

voice 17 Limerick locale 18 Like long

grasses 19 Marseilles Ms. 20 Lanchester

of film 21 — Dawn Chong 22 Fabled

lumberjack 24 Ski tow (hyph.) 26 — Minor 27 Walk

nonchalantly 30 Courier 34 Very pale 35 Grasping 36 Quaker pronoun 37 Ms. Hagen of

films 38 Rap sheet info 39 911 responder 40 Succotash bean 42 Strong, dark beer 43 Farr of

“M.A.S.H.” 45 “The 400 Blows”

director 47 Toast edges 48 Finish the

laundry 49 Price tag 50 Opera barber 53 Take it on the — 54 Boxcar rider 58 Mighty steed 59 Bete — 61 Libra’s stone 62 Ski mecca 63 Rectify 64 Greet the

dawn 65 Murray or Baxter 66 Chop — 67 Takes notice of DOWN 1 “Fish Magic”

artist 2 Mr. Diamond 3 Thole fillers 4 Envelop 5 Team cheer 6 “— — You

Knocking” 7 Clarified butter 8 Paul Newman role 9 Acrobat 10 Be certain of 11 Clay jar 12 Highland valley 15 Seed catalog

offerings 23 — Enterprise 25 Forbid 26 Alaskan craft 27 River rapids 28 Moving about 29 Famed orca 30 Turn out 31 Throat-clearing

sounds 32 Send, as payment 33 Toadies’

responses 35 Vocally 38 Shellfish 41 Cordial 43 Next year’s grads. 44 Royalty recipients 46 Gift-tag word 47 Eddie Murphy

movie 49 Judy of

“Laugh-In” 50 Falafel bean 51 Afghanistan’s

neighbor 52 Narrow the gap 53 Place 55 Mayberry moppet 56 It turns litmus

blue 57 Pamplona yells 60 Mantra chants

I’m sorry about your mom. I hope you give yourself time to recover.

My hunch is that it’s in your father’s emotional makeup to live in the present as a passive participant — meaning, whatever his current circumstances offer him, that’s where his attention rests. This trait can be hard to spot in people who serve as your emotional pillars, though; often we see them more for their role in our lives than for who they really are.

And for our expectation that they want to stay close to us.

If he is this way, then maybe he didn’t leave you behind so much as you left him behind to attend to your mother.

That would also mean it’s a simple problem to correct, though: You just need to be steadily present again.

By being with him as you’re able, and by embracing these new family members, you can bring him back to you.