Simple things

We are borrowing one of my parents' cars right now for yet another repair on the Volvo.
This morning, when I drove away from my home on my way to work, I enjoyed the sounds of
a tape in the deck...maybe Enrique Chia's clangy pounding that manages to sound romantic on the piano.
Sounds I'll always associate with my dad.  And I was thinking of how hard it is to connect with him,
how he doesn't engage, how difficult it will be to let go of that opportunity when he is no longer here...

Then the tape was broken with the sound of my father, speaking in a voice more sweetly than I knew
he possessed.  And he was repeating a name that's burned on a part of my broken heart...

Galito?  Galito? 

The voice repeats perhaps 20 times, sweetly, softly and searching...and then just for a second, I hear my brother's
adult voice in the background, saying something inaudible.  Then another song cuts in...I felt like I'd been touched from
some other world, or that there was some parralel universe where my father and brother shared only soft voices,
tender moments and Enrique Chia.

I wondered how often my father listened to this tape, and if he fast-forwarded through the music just to hear the quick
unintelligible mutterances of my long-gone brother...his only son whose name is written all over his broken heart, and I thought of my
sweet children and their tender voices, and how precious we all are to somebody.  We miss you, Galito.