Caroline was not a vain child. She was not puffed up by her father’s
admiration, only sweetly warmed and comforted by the unconscious
knowledge that to one human being on this earth she
mattered supremely.
Pilgrim’s Inn by Elizabeth Goudge
One frosty night this winter hunkered in the folds of flannel sheets and a fur throw I read the above quote in the text of the 1948 novel, Pilgrim’s Inn written by English novelist Elizabeth Goudge. Inadvertently tears fill my eyes. Then follows a longing that mostly rests untouched beneath the surface of my consciousness; the longing for my father who loved me as that father loved his little girl.
I appreciate Elizabeth Goudge’s writing. Her expansive and exquisite description of nature. Her distinctive characterizations. Her able rendering of place and time. This novel depicts a family post World War II, fractured, grieving yet bravely striving to recover in fits and starts the ability to see beauty, to feel love, to conquer fear.
A book like this is, to me like comfort food or what I call a “going home to grandma” feeling, providing one has had a grandma who was the essence of safety and predictability and unconditional love. I had a grandma like that. We called her Nanna. But I digress. I’ve written essays on Nanna before and this one is about my father, Clyde Dennis. Just typing that name and seeing it in print gives me pause. His name automatically conjures so many memories I can barely discern which to access fully. And perhaps because he was a printer, the printed word and the printed Word, which I have capitalized intentionally were hallmarks in his life.
Over these last days, moved by the novelist’s brief description of a father-daughter relationship I have tried to find time to put into words, to probe on a deeper level the emotions I still feel as I age. To examine the emotions particularly of what the loss of my father still means to me all these many decades later. And how a few simple phrases in an old English novel can bring quick tears and days of reflection.
My father was six feet tall, lean, brown eyed with dark curly hair. They said I was a “daddy’s girl” favored my father in looks, though a blonder curly haired version. I thought my father was handsome and could not have been prouder when told I resembled him. I called him “Daddy” and when I think of him even now he is my daddy. I was 21 when he died and he was 48. Our relationship was less complicated and fraught than that with my mother. He was a completely benign presence in my life.
My father and mother were true sweethearts, physically affectionate and loving to one another open in their admiration of each other. “Isn’t Mommy beautiful”, he’d say. Or she, “”your daddy is guileless. Do you know what that means April”? They met at 18 and waited five years to marry as they had responsibilities to each of their single parent families to provide support. They had me, their first child and only daughter three years after they were married, my brothers three and five years later.
Memories of the past are not usually chronological and that is true for me when I remember my father. We live in Evanston. We are one half block from Lake Michigan. Ocean-like we can hear the lake roaring on rough and windy days and nights. We live in a new house. I can picture every room still. My room is under the eves, small and cosy and next to my parents bedroom. There are no en suites in most houses in the late 40’s and ours is no exception. I love my room. It is decorated with unbleached muslim curtains and dressing table, a patchwork quilt and built in bookshelves by my twin bed. I have a good selection of books but my favorites are horse and dog stories. The best gifts I get for Christmas are more horse and dog books with china horse and dog statues to accompany them.
I am nine or ten or so and we drive the three blocks to the Chicago Northwestern station on Chicago avenue to pick up my dad from the train if the weather is poor and he isn’t walking home. The steam engine chugs into the station. I am so glad to see my daddy. I love the way he looks in his suit and overcoat and fedora hat. He smells like “train” and “work”. He turns around in the passenger seat as my mother drives, hugs us with his smile. When we get home he envelopes us with real bear hugs. The house smells like roasting meat. The table is already set. Moody radio plays a program of hymns accompanied by a steel guitar. My father loves the twang of the guitar and a favorite hymn is “Over the Sunset Mountains”. The lyrics, “Over the sunset mountains someday I’ll softly go, into the arms of Jesus, He who loves me so…”. Does this portend the early death of someone who is going to die way too soon?