Waiting for Dad

Then one day he's waiting for you

Photo by Idzard Schiphof on Unsplash

The faint tap-tap-tap has become a familiar sound as I pick up my sons from school this year. Usually around 4:45 pm, as I swing open my car door, I hear that hollow thump coming from a second story window.

Walter is waiting for me. He can see my usual parking spot from his classroom and he stands guard after he wraps up his afternoon art project. The tapping sound is his signal for me to look up — he’s there smiling, waving, and he’s been waiting.

I remember that exact feeling, sitting in a classroom 30 years ago in Missouri, wondering when my dad would arrive.

My mom and dad divorced when I was six. They mostly kept us out of the messiness, my mom assuming full custody and my dad taking us every other weekend. Naturally, I came to idealize my dad. He was the fun, cool one who let us watch 90210 and spend $20 at Fun Factory arcade.

On super special days, usually once per semester, my dad would pick me up from school to go have lunch. The place was my choice. And my choice was always Taco Bell. He’d ask what I wanted him to wear to pick me up (usually something Tommy Hilfiger), probably assuming that I’d be embarrassed of him in the wrong outfit, but that wasn’t possible. I was so proud of him. I was so proud to be his.

As the clock ticked closer to lunchtime, I’d nervously crunch lacquered pieces of my Aqua Net bowl cut shell, wondering if he was coming. He’d never not shown up for lunch in the past, but what if he forgot or got too busy or got paged into work. I distinctly remember trying to focus on cursive and multiplication in third grade and being far too preoccupied. My dad was coming. He was coming, right?

Then the intercom would crackle to life: “Chance Seales to the office.”

My dad had come. He remembered. He loved me. He was wearing a Tommy Hilfiger shirt and Eternity for Men. He had a cold Pepsi waiting for me in the cupholder. I was special. He cared.

In 2022, my dad was in end stage kidney failure. He was only 64 but needed dialysis three times a week.

My dad Raymond was a proud, stubborn man who’d kept secret his worsening diabetes, refusing insulin for ages and ignoring warnings from his doctors that his kidney function was deteriorating, and that without intervention the end would be near. We only got the full truth once he crash landed in the ER.

My dad had made peace with death privately, but this was all new to us and we begged him to do dialysis. He reluctantly agreed. My mom, his ex-wife of 30+ years, put together all the supplies he’d need to stay comfortable during his marathon treatments: crosswords, slippers, iPad and phone chargers, extra fluffy blankets because he always felt cold.

I was in Washington during much of his treatment back in Missouri, but one morning I was visiting home and headed up to the dialysis center to pick him up post-treatment. The doors were locked and I could see that the good-natured nurses were busy helping patients.

I peeked in the window and spotted my dad. He was waiting for me.

Sitting in a wheelchair, looking depleted but determined, he was bundled up in a winter jacket with his comfort kit on his lap, looking out at the parking lot and waiting for me to arrive.

At that moment, I wondered if he had the same feelings I used to have: Is he coming? Did he forget? Is he too busy? Am I special? Does he care?

I knocked on the wooden door’s small window and he looked up, seeing just a sliver of my face through the pane. I fought the urge to cry at witnessing his physical frailty and instead came in to say how he was one tough guy, how his color was really coming back. I met his favorite nurses and dialysis buddies (and the loud lady who bugged him), and then we slowly made our way to the car. I didn’t have Taco Bell waiting, but he enjoyed the low-sodium turkey sandwich I’d made.

One week later, we agreed with my dad that it was time to stop dialysis given his prognosis, allowing him to live his final days peacefully with hospice care at my sister’s home. We were all together in the end.

Today, when I see my son looking out the window of his school, I always give him the biggest, silliest wave I can muster. My sweatpants and huge kisses don’t embarrass him yet. When we see each other, I want him to remember the smile on my face and the pride in my eyes.

I know the joy of seeing your dad arrive. Now I know the feeling is fifty times stronger when he sees his son.