When the wind brings a father back to life

The river still runs. It tumbles over boulders, catches the sunlight and sparkles, it splashes on to the rocky shore, then rolls back into the swiftly moving current. Tangled bits of broken twigs and red-gold leaves bounce and twist in the churning water, bunching up against the rocks in jumbled knots before breaking loose to flow downstream. The river moves forward, fast and unstoppable, swirling like a dancer. And then there are the places where the water is still and the wind ripples the surface of the water with a gentle touch, like a soft breath. The wind and the rolling water fold and weave together with the sound of an ancient chant.

The road along the river’s edge bends in and out of shadows. Tiny, tired looking flowers and wilted weeds are scattered in the mounds of dirt and dusty gravel lining the road. There is no fence or railing, no barrier between the road and the water. Only air and wind.

I used to imagine that my father flew over the river. I dreamed he never landed, but just kept going, off into the clear blue morning sky. Quiet. Soaring. Safe.

But he didn’t. The river took my father. It took his breath away.

Our family would drive to my grandparent’s farm in North Dakota every summer when I was growing up. My father liked to drive late into the night. The air was cool then, and we could roll the windows up half way and be lulled by the gentle humming of the car’s engine. The summer wind blew my hair across my face, like a cool caress. My mother, sisters and brother would fall asleep, their heads pressed against the windows. Leaning my head into my pillow, I watched the lights of the cities give way to the dark midwestern prairies as I sat behind my dad. I didn’t say anything, but I forced myself to stay awake. My father would play the radio low as we drove and I could hear Frank Sinatra or Nat King Cole or some instrumental I did not recognize. Sometimes my dad hummed along, but I stayed quiet. He never knew I was awake, breathing the same air behind him. Listening. Watching. I thought I was helping him somehow. I didn’t want him to be alone.

When we turned on to the gravel road leading to the farm, I could see the wheat fields stretch out for miles under a pale blue sky. Tall wheat stalks bowed and bent as the hot wind swept over the fields, rippling like waves in a golden sea. The only sounds were the whispery hush of the wind and the low purr of tractors moving back and forth, churning dust and grasshoppers into the air. My father spent those summer days on the farm hauling bales of straw and harvesting wheat. I watched as the tractor he drove bumped and bounced through the rows of wheat, his face shining in the sun. His eyes were focused, gazing straight ahead. He always looked peaceful out there. Content. Happy. The wind blew bits of straw and dust across his face and into his hair and onto his arms. He was out in the fields until the sun went down.

There was always a quiet distance between my father and me. It was as if I was peeking over a fence, looking into a place I wanted to be. I could not figure out how to climb over the fence. Maybe he didn’t know how to either.

My father became ash and dust and was scattered into the wind, over the ocean, rivers and fields. I imagined the ashes swirling like a dance; lifting, falling, moving into the sky and around the trees and over mountains and rocks, settling among the flowers and grasses. He went everywhere. He is everywhere.

I stand sometimes at the edge of the river or in a field. The river never stops. It runs as it always has and the wind blows across the fields. I breathe and I know I am not alone. My father is in that wind. The river took my father, but the wind brings him back to me.

When they were young, my children would dance. They twirled and swirled, moving across the room, threading themselves into the music, as if tossed about by the wind. It made me smile as I watched. When the music ended, they would breathlessly turn to me and ask, “Did you like it, Mom? Was it good?”

Before I answered, I wondered, as they stood before me after their final twirl, if my father ever thought of me as part of the wind. Did he watch me dance? And then I told them, “It was so beautiful. You dance like the wind.”