A lesson my dad imposed upon me at every opportunity was,

If you want something, you have to be willing to earn it.

Cookie jars on tall counters were a favorite lesson of his when I was younger,

and more recently he bought an older car and told me if I could fix it, it was mine.

Grease-packed nails and bruised knuckles weren't exactly the sort of fantasies I'd had

about high school when I was playing princess, but the hours spent cursing and bolts and

looking over manuals with him. Those are treasures that I hold dearly.

Find a way to get what you need, so you can have what you want.

That was how he was, always insisting on my independence.

I suppose he was scared that I'd run into a younger version of himself out there in the world,

and, like my mother, be too timid to reject his advances.

Dad tried hard to make it right once mom escaped what he had thought to call a family.

He'd never meant to make her do something she didn't want. He thought she was happy. Happy to be his

wife, happy to be my mother, but she wasn't. And as soon as she saw the opportunity, she left.

Dad scared I'll be like her. Too scared of making a mistake to make my own choices. Too scared

to tell him what I wanted. Too scared to tell him how I felt. Visions of a peasant girl

doomed to the service of an arrogant king. It likely colored his reflection in the bathroom mirror, a somber shade of blue.

So I always made an effort to show him that I was happy.

I was strong, and that I loved him.

I wanted to change how he saw himself, to paint the mirror all the colors of the rainbow,

like the tinted glass of a church honoring a saint.

I wanted him to be free of her, and I wanted the same for myself.

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