FACING THE MUSIC
At 73, he is still a handsome man. Granted the lines in his face are deeper, more pronounced, but many of them are lines of happiness—the crinkles at the corners of his eyes, the wrinkles bracketing his mouth where faint dimples used to be, are the tracks of twenty-five years of smiles—and he would not trade even one of those smiles to have the smoothest skin of a baby's cheek.
His hair is completely white now, but at least, he sometimes jokes, he still has it.
Despite numerous surgeries on his knees, he finds it necessary to walk with a cane most of the time. But not today. Today he stands straight, on his own, and is determined to stay that way. At least for the next little while.
His brown eyes are alight with pride, and damp with tears as he watches the beautiful young woman in white walking toward him. He draws himself up even straighter as she approaches. The smile on her face is her mother's smile—that million-watt flash of brilliance that he has loved for so long. And at this moment it is entirely for him! Five minutes from now it will belong to another man, but in this instant, he can savor the warmth that settles over him as he recognizes that look of adoration he has basked in for nearly 23 years.
From the moment she opened her infant eyes—eyes that would quickly darken to chocolate brown like his—she has gazed at him with that incredible love and hero-worship that he has struggled so to be worthy of.
She reaches his side, and takes his proffered arm, and they stand there, at the lower end of a thirty-foot aisle that will change their lives forever. A two-minute walk that will take her from his world into the world of that other man. As they wait for their cue his eyes search her face, memorizing the shape of his little girl's cheek, the smile on her lips, the light in her eyes.
One of the tears that has been hovering finally breaks free, and slips down along the obstacle course of his cheek. She leans up and kisses it away. "Daddy, I love you," she whispers. "Don't cry."
"I love you, too, Sunshine," he replies, amazed that his voice is steady and strong. "More than you can imagine."
The music swells, and they step forward.
His baby, his only daughter, is getting married.
