Father's Day

Yesterday, on Father's Day, I received several pictures from my grandfather of his father, Carl Johnson. Among them was the picture above: my grandfather as a young boy (between Corin and Seth's present ages from the looks of it) sitting with his parents. I love this picture for many reasons, among them that my grandfather looks very much himself. There is something about him that has held steady all these years, resisting change despite the eight and a half decades that have been added to his life since he and his parents sat, that day, for the photographer.

One of the pleasures of receiving photographs of one's ancestors on a day set aside for honoring fathers is the quiet harmonic this creates between then-time and now-time. It is easy in the course of dailyness to forget we owe our very lives to continuity that extends far beyond us. But here are some pictures that remind me of the story in which I stand.

My dad: this is the last picture that was taken of the two of us before his subdural hematoma two summers ago. Thankfully his was a complete recovery, but this picture still chills me as it captures us hiking-tired, happy in the sunshine, and unaware of how close we'd come to losing him in the next six weeks. We stand atop Cathedral Ledges, a favorite family hike (taking the Boulder Loop Trail, of course, and finishing by wetting our feet in the river that runs along the Kancamagus). Never one to miss the vista, my dad enjoyed, that day and always, the getting there and the coming back. In this he is not unlike a famous New Hampshirite who once wrote:

Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

It seems that shortly after our hike, my father would climb a paper-white trunk toward heaven, till the top dipped and set him back down. And how grateful I am for that "coming back."

My paternal grandparents, Howard and Florence Joss: This is a picture I took of them, having paused the film of their wedding day in 1936 and applying my shutter to the screen. I love their smiles, my grandmother is radiant as she was her whole life, my grandfather looks entirely happy and proud. Grandfather Joss died when I was in third grade and I remember little of him beyond the tremendous jars of pennies he collected, the way he called my grandmother "Doll," the warmth with which he joked with us children.

This seems an appropriate Father's Day photo. Taken last month in Pennsylvania, Tim and his dad confer about bait while the boys await their turn to fish. And below is the sweet little sunny who obliged to be caught (posed for a picture and released).

And a final Father's Day shot. Taken several years ago when Corin was not quite three and Seth was a baby. Tim, wonderful father, strolls with his sons. The ridge ahead is filled with light and shadow, like all life. Carrying one, a hand on the head of the other, Tim walks, drawing them along, up the path.