He heard more about him as he got older. But most of it had begun to sound the same...
"Your father was a good man...a great doctor...would be proud of you."
Personally he was almost sick of hearing about him. Sick of hearing about a man he never even saw, not even once.
He vaguely remembers his mother crying a lot, even more often then himself.
His sisters show him pictures of their childhood and he hates that his pictures don't have the tall man that were in theirs. He hates that he missed knowing this good man and great doctor.
The shorter man in his pictures now is like a decoy of the real thing. The substitute dad he got in place of that good man and great doctor. He really wishes he would have known that man, more than anything.
His Mother doesn't bring up the subject, in fact avoids it like the plague. Though, he sometimes catches her looking at pictures of their wedding on their would be anniversary or holidays. He knows she misses him and wishes in some odd way, he could too.
He wants to miss him, but how could be miss someone he never met. On his father's birthday, his sisters and family would cry and reminisce. But he never got to. He didn't even feel like he could console his family, and would leave the room any chance he had.
He was left to ponder who this good man was. He wrote letters to his friends from Korea when he got older and read stories of the sort of man he was and the things he did. They all spoke highly of him and missed him very much. He stopped writing the letters as he was growing in jealously that men twenty thousand miles knew his dad better than he got to.
Some of his patients still stop by now and again to see his Mother and sisters. They all felt so sorry for them still, but he felt out of place. How could he miss a man he never knew, let alone saw?
I don't want them to feel sorry for me, I never even knew him. He would think and retreat as far away as he could.
So now, on one of the most important days of his life, he is left pondering if that good man and great doctor would indeed be proud of him. As he grabs the diploma he glances at the seats where his dads friends from Korea are watching, and as soon as the ceremony is over, he heads their way first.
"Thanks for sending us an invitation." The black and gray haired man says with a smile, taking the young mans hand.
"Thanks for being my... dads friend." He still struggled calling a man he never met his Dad. He shook the hand and smiled.
"He'd be proud." The older man replied, getting a nod from the group which now stood around him.
With no reply and just a smile he headed over to his family.
Hours later he disappeared and found himself in front of a stone of a would be stranger. He laid his diploma down next to the American flag and cried for his father for the first time in his life... he wept continually for what seemed like hours. Suddenly a shorter man tapped him on the shoulder...
"Thought you'd be here for some reason. I was just coming to tell your dad about the ceremony, but I see you've already done that so..."
"Dad wait, I'll walk back with you, just give me a minute..."
The man nodded and paced back to his car, watching from a distance.
He picked up the diploma and stood up, his tears still flowing...
"I knew you'd be proud...I know now."
The stone of the man he was now leaving was no longer a stranger...
'Henry Blake
Loving Husband and Father...'
