A Walk With My Father
Written by Guest Author, Shannon Miller
Dad,
You never understood why I ran, no matter how many times and ways I tried to explain it.
It was healthy.
It was social.
It got me outside, away from mothering and computer-ing and spinning.
It was an escape, the physical expression of white noise, a blurring of the obligations and pressures that punctuated my day and prodded me awake at 1:32 am with the inexplicable feeling of lateness.
Running was proof of life, that my body was strong, that I could endure the next pandemic or election or other Big Terrible. All I’d need to feel better, no matter what happened, was a few miles.
You were a walker. Not evangelical particularly, but dedicated, rain or shine, every day through the bulrushes near Lake Wilcox or up the road past Tom’s place with the hydrangeas and good lawn. You knew every dog in town, which ones your dog liked (practically none), which ones he would tolerate (few), and which ones made him snarly and murderous (a vast majority). You walked because it was healthy. It was social. It got you outside. And you were obsessed with your FitBit the way my kids are obsessed with Minecraft.
You often left a message to let me know when you’d hit your step goal. At the end of the day, you’d leave another message letting me know how many steps you’d exceeded it by. Occasionally, we’d get competitive with metrics. I told you my marathon was around 53,000 steps. You told me you saw six ducklings and listened to four chapters of James Patterson.
But walking wasn’t proof of life for you, it was proof of living. There was no duress to your outings. No sense of obligation. You often walked with coffee in your hand and took your time unfurling the thin blue dog poop bag. You took pictures, sometimes with the Canon, and researched parks and little lakeside villages you wanted to visit. For you, walking was the entry point to life, not the escape. I saw the appeal, though I’d never admit it.
Running versus walking seemed like a perfect, good-natured thing for a father and daughter to argue about. So we did, for years—steps versus miles, this shoe versus that one, trail versus road.
You died in July on a very hot Thursday. You were wearing your FitBit and it was the Biggest Terrible I could imagine:
Choosing the music and clothes for your funeral.
Rooting through the desk drawers for your passwords.
Casket rental.
The awful moment after someone is gone when the ones left behind decide what every little thing means and doesn’t—leather shoes? Books? Unchewed sticks of gum? Your university degree? A time capsule of a life, made after the fact.
I took five tee shirts, some guitar picks, a thin gold chain, and your FitBit. You’d gone for the unsporty kind with heavy links and frosted black everything. I thought about taking the charging cord and plugging it in but never could. I was too afraid to see what your heart did right before you left and how many steps you’d taken on your last walk earthside. I never used it, I just wore it around like an odd piece of jewelry and said it was out of batteries whenever someone stopped to ask for the time.
The watch was awful to run with. For one, it didn’t fit and hung down close to my knuckles. It also jangled in the heavy way of loose change and made me self-conscious, like a cat embarrassed by her bell. The combination of my sweat and the metal stung the tender, nearly translucent skin around my wrist and left a terrible welt.
By mile four of my third run with the watch, I gave up and started walking. I didn’t have a pocket to put it in and I didn’t want to lose it, even though it was clunky and desperately un-fun. The adrenaline drained from my body. My breath was sour. Sweat dripped down my back like rain on a pane of glass. I saw the world without you in it. And my God, it wasn’t the sort of thing I could ever outrun. So, I just kept walking.
I walked through a tickseed meadow and by a slow, brown river. I walked past a man with a white beard and a matching white dog. The blood left my cheeks and returned in a warm flow to the other parts of my body. I took down my hair, which was stringy and wet. I got a coffee.
And suddenly, there you were in light roast and the outstretched wings of a bird on a wire. You were the pebble lodged in the gummy pink grooves of the shoe I’d argued was best. You were the picture I took of the shagbark hickory. You were there, in every single step. And just between us, you were right about the walking.
Among your legacies is a mile of aliveness every morning, where joy comes and pain comes and nothing is blurry. Where I miss you and feel you in equal measure, a place to linger instead of escape.
I walk because it’s healthy, it’s social, and it gets me outside. I walk because you’re gone and because you’re everywhere, because all of my steps, hundreds of thousands, are yours, too.
Walk on,
Shannon
Shannon Miller a best-selling collaborative writer and editor who works with authors, agents, and publishers to tell courageous, unifying stories. Her book projects have gone on to become national bestsellers, receive starred reviews from prominent literary magazines, and garner praise from celebrated authors including Elizabeth Gilbert, Glennon Doyle, Dolly Parton, and Cheryl Strayed. She lives in Nashville, TN with her super-awesome family and she's just finished writing her first novel.