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failure and resentment got to him, was a lot more like God the Father. Dad was almighty, as most dads are
     to their kids. Dad wasn’t majestic or holy, but he was good—he was good to me. In fact, my early memories of Dad are the brightest
     childhood memories I have. Dad loved to tell jokes and was endlessly entertained by mine. He was quick to scoop me up for
     a hug. Once he came home with a jumbo bag of Starburst candy and threw the contents up in the air, just to watch his kids
     scramble with delight. I guess Dad was like God the Father in that he delighted in his children and he satisfied our desires
     with good things. I never imagined God or Jesus having fun, but my dad loved to have fun. It was Dad who told us bedtime stories.
     It was Dad who took us miniature golfing and out for walks with the dogs. I don’t know where Mom was—maybe at church.
    When we first moved to Orange County, we lived in an apartment across a field from the mall. Dad’s optometric practice was
     in the Sears store there. I must have gotten on my mom’s nerves, asking her to take me miniature golfing or to go on a walk
     or to give me a hug, because she usually kept her back to me: cooking or ironing or sighing. So I learned to ask different
     questions: When was Dad coming home? How long was “a while”? When did it get dark?
    “Go upstairs and look out the window,” my mother replied one day. “When the green Sears sign comes on, that’s when Daddy is
     coming home. Go on. Go on upstairs and watch.” So most evenings I went upstairs and sat at the window, waiting for the Sears
     sign to come on. My older brothers, Rob and Jim, came in to play their Beatles 45’s on the Close ’N Play. Nancy often came
     and sat with me. But I stayed in the window, waiting for the green Sears sign to come on, waiting for Dad to come home, waiting
     to be seen.
    Early Fun Dad was my hero. When I was four I got a plush toy cat for my birthday. I took Fuzzy everywhere: to the market,
     to bed, to church, on trips, and especially to scary places like Grandma Jean’s house. Holding Fuzzy filled the hole between
     my arms and made me feel safe. Eventually Fuzzy wore out. Her fuzz turned to nubs, she lost an eye, and the stuffing came
     out of her neck. Jim teased me and called her Nubby. Finally, Mom had had it and threw Fuzzy in the trash. But Dad rescued
     her. Jim restuffed her neck with cotton balls, painted her ears with pink shoe polish. Maybe he helped because he felt guilty
     for calling her Nubby. But Dad saved her because he loved me.
    Years later, we were on a family vacation to Washington. After a day trip to an island, Dad promised my brothers we’d take
     a train ride through the longest tunnel in the Pacific Northwest. The boys were thrilled and so was Dadtrains were the one
     thing they still had in common. My brothers were in high school; they had discovered sarcasm. They could sit in the car for
     hours, silent and sullen, but mention trains and they lit up. The train ride was going to be the highlight of the trip for
     my brothers, and it was Dad’s last chance to win back their respect.
    We took the hour-long ferry ride back to the mainland to wait for the train. That’s when I felt a thud in my gut: I had left
     Fuzzy on the ferry. I had already left her in a hardware store in Eugene, Oregon. No way would they go back again—we would
     miss the train. When Dad saw the horror on my face, he coaxed the reason out of me.
    Only now can I imagine my father’s dilemma: having to choose between his sons who were rapidly coming to despise him, and
     a young daughter who still thought he hung the moon; sons whose approval he longed for, and his daughter whom he still had
     a chance to keep in his orbit.
    Dad drove us out to a promontory to watch the train. The boys stood out close to the tracks, seething as the train flew by
     without them. My father stood a few feet behind, watching the boys with their backs turned to him, as