A Short Visit

Last week was the break between the end of spring semester clinic and the beginning of summer clinic. Saturday May 5th was graduation and the faculty and students all got to put on their caps and gowns and act like we actually know something about life.

Afterwards I took a few days to visit my father in southern Missouri. I’ve written about him before. He is very old and still lives by himself on twenty acres just outside of a small town in the Ozarks. I hesitate finding the time to go visit, I don’t know why because I always come away invigorated and feeling much better about life in general.

We get up early and drink coffee while watching the menagerie of song birds, retiles and small animals that keep him entertained out his backdoor. I also find myself catching up on world happenings. He takes the daily paper and reads it front to back. He catches the early local news, the national news and then “The News Hour with Jim Lehrer”.

Mid-afternoon we waited out a sudden spring thunderstorm at the local VFW drinking a couple of cold draft beers. That evening for supper we cooked up a few fish that I had caught that morning in the pond, along with grilled pork chops and baked potatoes. After listening to the St. Louis Cardinals game on the radio (he NEVER misses a game) we called it a night.

The next morning I had to return to Kansas City.