Crying

I've rarely cried as an adult. I don't think it's a sign of weakness in a man, or anything, it's just not a way I've ever expressed my emotions.

My law partner Paul is the opposite. He's bombastic, and aggressive, and cries easily. Once, when we learned some awful news about a client we both had grown close to, he grew dewey eyed, and I sat impassive. "Boy," he said, "you are really one cold son of a bitch."

Well, as I slouch towards 50, things are changing. Maybe my male hormones are decreasing, or maybe I'm gaining more wisdom and feeling. Whatever it is, I need to stock up on the Kleenex.

Over last Winter break, as Wifey and I were confronting marital issues, I let loose several times. The peak was coming down to D1's room one morning, where she, Wifey, and D2 were all lying together, laughing. It was the most beautiful scene I had ever witnessed, and the tears flowed like a river.

Last night, D1 made it home safely from UF, and she and Wifey were downstairs, laughing and talking. D2 was with them, and then went out. I went to bed, and turned on the TV. One of my favorite movies was on Turner Classics: "Fiddler on the Roof."

I've always loved that musical and Sholem Aleichem's character Tevye because I imagine my grandparents and great parents living exactly as Tevye did, in Tsarist Russia. But now, as the father of adult (nearly) daughters, his character and dealing with his daughters takes on a new resonance.

"Sunrise, Sunset," played at the wedding scene, didn't get me this time. That's one of my family's dearest songs --it ALWAYS makes my sisters and mother bawl, with its melancholy sweetness, of watching our children grow to adults.

No --this time, it was Tevye taking his daughter to the train station our in the middle of nowhere, so she could meet her fiance in Kiev. She sings "Far from the Home I Love," and of course the film shows scenes of her as little girl, running through fields of flowers, into her loving father's arms, contrasted with her as a grown up, now making the heart wrenching choice of leaving her family to join the man she will marry.

At the end of the scene, Tevye helps her onto the train, and you can just feel his grief. She turns back to him one last time, and says "Papa --God knows when we shall see each other again." He replies, choked up,"Then we will leave it in God's hands."

The train pulls away, over the frozen Russian plains, and he runs after it, as his daughter looks back on him and her homeland, seeing them for probably the last time.

I bawled like a baby. I don't remember EVER crying like that before. I mean, the scene in "Mask" where Eric Stoltz dies got a few whimpers out of me, but nothing like this.

I don't know. Today is Valentine's Day. Maybe all of this emotional crap is just in the air, and I've caught it like a respiratory infection.

This morning, I made D1 French toast, and Wifey came down to the table. As I was recounting the movie's scene, I got teary eyed again. D1 hugged me and said in her sweet voice: "Daddy --but I'm never moving far away from you."

I hope that remains true.