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My Father's Seeds
If I were to describe something about my father, I would start with his sunflower seeds. I can’t remember seeing him without those things. Since he worked out of town, I got to see him very little but every time he was around, we would do plenty stuff together. He was a very spontaneous man. Time brings me back to a road trip we had to San Diego’s Zoo in 1998. My father checked me out early from school on a Friday, which was very pleasant because I hadn’t seen him in a while. My entire family was in the truck and as soon as I got inside, I could smell the seeds. He always kept a huge bag in the glove compartment along with a plastic bottle to spit in the shells. It was going to be a long drive to California, so we had to stop in a store to buy food, drinks, batteries for our Gameboys and Walkman, etc. My father came back with an enormous container full of seeds and he placed it in the trunk. Since I was the youngest of my brothers, I had to sit at the very back of the truck. That very peculiar smell of the seeds gave me a headache at that time. I could hear my father talk about his work to my mother as I snoozed off. My father decided to take a little detour to the north of Arizona. The Grand Canyon is one of the most impressive things I’ve ever witnessed in my life. As a sat on the edge, my father, with a handful of seeds in his mouth, told me that a real man is only allowed to cry for two occasions, funerals and the Grand Canyon. Those words have been in my heart since that day. The next day, we started driving towards San Diego. My mother had some family members living in Tijuana and they were going to meet us at the Zoo. When we got to the zoo, my mother was in charge of my brothers and I got to hang out with my father. I remember walking around the zoo with him holding my hand and a plastic bottle with the seed shells in the other hand. I had a blast. To this day, that very peculiar smell of sunflower seeds makes me remembers all the good times I shared with my father.
