My parents divorced when I was eleven.

Mom remarried and moved to Phoenix. Dad stayed exactly where he was, spending the next thirty-two years in that same house, working as a contractor — adding rooms and decks to other people’s homes while letting his own age comfortably around him.

I visited every few weeks. We’d have dinner, watch baseball, argue over things that didn’t matter, and usually understand each other by the end of the evening.

Dad wasn’t a man who spoke openly about feelings, but he was there when it counted, and that always mattered to me more than words would have.

I also had two half-siblings from one of Dad’s later relationships.