Father genes

The genetic, predispostioned traces of my father are taking a rumpus. They have begun to spill into outward & observable characteristics that I can only excuse with a smile & shrug. I did not inherit a strong jaw, a thick head of hair, or have an innate ambition to be a graduate of West Point Academy. I am sure this was a bummer for him. I tended to cry & cover my ears when his beloved T-28 aircraft fired it's engine. "But this is one of the sharpest aircrafts ever. You may never be this close to one again," my father yelled over the droning blasts of fuel. I shook my head with my bangs sweeping and blowing in the wind caused by the circulation of propellers. They were too close- we would get sucked in by the propellers and chopped up by this sharp aircraft. I was sure. I glared at him in true 6 year old angst. How disappointed he must have been to not share this love with his only child. A daughter.

Now I am twenty four & I have yet to make an attempt at casting my future toward becoming a Notre Dame quarterback. But things are happening to me. Things that can resemble only one person that I know. I have gingerly laughed off the first two resemblences. I attribute them to the possibility that my blood carries a little too much testosterone. A true love of moving boxes from one point in space to another can be useful at certain points in one's lifetime. The desire to dig holes- the perfect hole- could also be seen as helpful or just a little strange given the context. If I were a children's book heroine I would be called Petunia Dig, Mamie told me this spring. But now I am taking plants. I am cruising the neighborhood and eyeing the ends of driveways so if a plant has been tossed, I will be the first to snatch it, move it, and dig a hole for it. I'm not quite sure where this will lead me- if it will go so far as my father who loves lifting trees. I am starting with Jade plants and tell myself it will end here. But I smile everytime I pass my new Jade and there is a feeling that tells me there will be more.
Schnute