If you get down and you quarrel everyday,
You’re saying prayers to the devils, I say.
Why not help one another on the way?
…Positive Vibration. Yeah. Positive.
–Bob Marley, Positive Vibration
Rain patters on the asphalt carrying the first perfume of an early spring.
I pace, kicking, grinding, and sliding in the gravel by the side of the road like a school boy. I hop on an old creosoted railroad tie, placed at the corner to form the boundary of a parking pad. I balance on my left foot holding my arms out like a tight-roper’s pole.
The two regular cars are here, a blue mega-SUV and a white compact wagon, waiting. Their engines hum and exhaust rises in the rain. Light sounds of FM radio leak through slightly cracked windows. For a moment, I wonder what the drivers must think of me behind their tinted glass, unable to stand still, pacing in the rain with no jacket.
Then, I hear the whine of yellow school bus brakes and the chug of a Jefferson County biodiesel engine. I spin to see the bus make its wide turn, headlamps two small search lights cutting the light fog. It picks up speed as it rolls up the street, then glissades to a stop like Nureyev.
The doors open, and Graham is the first to tumble off. The driver waves at me, and I wave back. Evan pushes past his brother, jumps the last step, and dashes toward me yelling, “Dad!”
“Have a good weekend,” I hear one of the kids tell the driver.
Evan hugs me, and Graham steps up close and takes my hand as we turn and walk toward the house.
“How was your day?” I ask.
“Great,” Evan tells me and runs ahead to pick up a beer can somebody has thrown to the side of the road. He collects them for our recycling and likes to tell me, “Litterers are evil.”
“How was you’re day, G?” I ask Graham, looking down and smiling.
“Good,” he says and swings our arms to skip. “We had a movie with an orchestra in Ms. Ball’s class, and they played music.”
“Cool. Was it good?”
“Pretty good,” he says, and we turn the corner.
Evan is already dashing across the street to our house when he remembers to look both ways, but I don’t holler at him.
Graham and I cross the street, and they notice Jenn’s car in the drive, then her smiling in the front doorway.
“Mommy!” they scream. Graham drops my hand, and both race to the door.
I’m walking the steps to the house, and I can hear my family skipping off to the kitchen for a snack.
It occurs to me for the first time: The only response I have ever heard from either of my children when I’ve asked “How was your day?” has been “Good,” and often it’s been “Great,” “Awesome,” or “Cool.”
I know, because I speak to their teachers, that they have difficult days, and I wouldn’t want to go back to the stress of elementary school myself.
But through failed art projects, disagreements on the playground, and correction for talking too much when it’s time to be quiet, they invariably tell me their days were, “Good, Dad. Thanks.”
How good is that?