Late on a beautiful Sunday morning, I found my daughter vegging out in front of the television and decided to at least act like a good father. “C’mon, I said. “Let’s go for a walk.”
“How long of a walk?” Natalie asked with a trace of suspicion.
“Two miles.”
“Two miles?”
“That’s nothing. Get your sneakers on.” As I expected, Natalie dragged her ass but, after lacing up and applying a thick layer of sunscreen, we finally set out on our constitutional. Of course, the whining started almost immediately.
“It’s too hot,” Natalie said, a mere four hundred yards in.
“It’s only seventy degrees,” I said.
“Ugh. The sun is so bright.”
“Stop your whinging, You need to work on your stamina.”
“What’s that?’
“Being able to push yourself.”
I’d wanted to go running that morning but had twisted my ankle jogging a few days before. Since there was no pain, I continued with my five miler but awoke the next morning with a bruised and swollen ankle. As luck would have it, my annual physical was later that afternoon and my doctor told me I’d probably busted a little blood vessel and to take it easy for a while. So, a nice recovery walk seemed in order and why not drag my kid along for the ride? Then I remembered why.
After the first hilly mile, Natalie was ready to throw in the towel, so I employed the go to move in every parent’s arsenal – bribery. “When we get into town,” I said, “I’ll buy you a treat.” Worked like a charm, but I also decided to turn the walk into a test of not only stamina, but skill.
“Natalie,” I said. “Next year you’ll be in middle school and have to walk home.”
“Yeah, then I can go to Playa Bowl with all the other kids,”
“But first, you have to learn to how to cross the highway of death.’
I didn’t really call it that but, in order to walk downtown, you have to navigate a treacherous intersection near my house that features a busy street with an on ramp for the Interstate. Even though it’s properly laid out with traffic signals, people always run the red light to get on the highway. Car collisions are common, and I know of at least two pedestrians who got run over. Scary as shit, but it was a hazard Natalie would eventually have to face.
“Okay,” I said, when we arrived at the location. “Hit the walk button.”
Now wait for the light to turn red and the walk signal to turn green.
Wait for all the cars to stop. Then look both ways but focus on the left. That’s where the danger will come from.
Okay, you can go.
Then, just as my daughter stepped into the road, a white sports car driven by a woman come tearing down the street. Pulling my daughter back, I watched open mouthed as she blew through the red and almost lose control after missing a car crossing the intersection by a whisker. For a moment, I thought about throwing my water bottle at her rear window. Crazy bitch.
“You see,” Natalie?” I said, overheating with rage. “People don’t care. They will run you over because they can’t stand being delayed a minute.”
“Can we go home now?” Natalie said, quite frightened.
“No. You have to learn how to do this. One day you’ll have to cross this street without me.”
It took some doing, but I finally got Natalie to cross the street by herself and then we walked to a coffee shop in town. Then, after I had iced coffee and my daughter ate a pastry, we repeated the whole confidence building exercise again.
“We’ll have to do this several more times before you can walk around town by yourself,” I said, as walked into our house.
“Can’t you just pick me up from middle school?”
I felt like telling Natalie when I was her age I regularly walked by my lonesome to my hometown’s movie theater, but realized she’d just roll her eyes if started any “back in my day” shit. “Then how will you go to Playa Bowl with your friends after school?” I said, instead.
“I’m so tired,” Natalie said, flopping on the couch with an exaggerated sigh. “I just want to watch TV now.”
‘Congratulations,” I said, after looking at the fitness gizmo on my wrist. “You walked two and a half miles.” Then, after firing off an email to the police chief complaining about the aforementioned intersection and offering ideas regarding enforcement (Wisely removing my suggestions to mete out extrajudicial killings), I took a shower, shaved and got dressed. We were going out to lunch with an old friend.
“That was good,” my friend said, pushing his plate away a few hours later. “Want dessert?”
“Yeah!” Natalie said. “Dessert!”
“I bought you ice cream the other day,” I said.
“But….”
“We’ll see. Let’s digest lunch first.”
Since it was still such a nice day, we drove into the historic district of a nearby town and took a self-guided tour through an arboretum on the grounds of a colonial mansion. My friend is a bit of a horticulturist and, as we walked amidst the flora and fauna, he described every plant we saw. Chagrined that I couldn’t tell one piece of greenery from the other, I decided to fact check him with Google Lens, but my friend was on the money every time. Showoff.
“What about dessert?” Natalie asked as we walked back to the car.
“There’s a nice crêperie by our house,” my wife suggested. Ah, not my thing.
“I was up here a few days ago,” I said. “There’s a jogging path nearby. Want to see it? More flowers for you guys to look at.”
“Not more walking!” Natalie cried.
“Sure,” my friend said. “Burn off some calories.”
The path was the same memory laden route I’d run down while trying to exorcise an ill mood three before. A paved county trail ribboning alongside some train tracks, it runs a mostly flat two and a half miles and ends near a house George Washington slept in during the Revolution. History and peristalsis. My history teacher dad would’ve been proud, but I also had an ulterior motive.
“Stop.” Natalie said over a mile in. “I can’t walk anymore.”
“Toughen up little camper,” I said, ignoring her discomfort.
“Where are we going?” my wife asked. “Wait,” I said.
Suppressing a chill as I walked past my old flame’s window, we eventually found ourselves under a train trestle with a set of stairs to the street above. After ascending the steps, my ulterior motive was revealed. “A Friendly’s!” my daughter yelped.
Smiling, I said to my wife, “I found this jogging here Thursday. After the old duffers are done walking along this path, they meet up here for coffee.”
“But you said Natalie had ice cream yesterday.”
“What can I say?” I said, shrugging. “I’m a horrible father.”
Although I’d just found out my cholesterol numbers were excellent, I limited myself to a small dish of butter crunch while everyone else had calorically disastrous sundaes. Watching my daughter as she chased her sugar dragon with untrammeled glee, I knew I was being overindulgent, but I also knew I was expiating the guilt I felt for running Natalie through that nerve wracking vehicular gauntlet. Maybe I’d pushed her too hard to fast. Then, when we were done, we walked all the way back to our car.
“My feet hurt,” Natalie said from the backseat.
“You had a lot of glucose to burn off,” I said. “And by the way, you walked six miles today.”
“Six miles?”
“Way to go kid.”
Afternoon gave way to evening and, by the time we got home, it was time for Natalie to get ready for bed. “No arguments. Hit the shower,” I said.
“But I took a bath this morning!”
“You walked six miles,” I said. “And you’re at the age where you start to stink.”
Worn out, Natalie crashed into bed. Then, a few hours later, as I was performing my own nightly ablutions, I heard the ear splitting screech of a speeding car slamming on its brakes. Expecting to hear the impact of metal on metal, I tensed up, but there was no bang, just another idiot joyriding on the highway of death. Shaken, I put my toothbrush back in its holder and walked into Natalie’s room where, watching another moonlit girl sleep, I found myself fighting a burgeoning sense of dread. Too many hazards. Too much heartache and danger. Too many damaged people. How will my little girl manage them all? I can only teach her so much.
Realizing my father probably thought the same things watching a younger me dream, I went to bed, knowing Natalie had miles to go and I had promises to keep.
