A Child's Hero

A single father becomes his young daughter's hero by typing.

“Jen e sais pas ce que je vais faire.” I crack one eye open to see where the upbeat music and French words are coming from. Lifting up my head and opening both eyes I turn my head to stare at the TV groggily, before recognizing the show as one of my dad’s. The cartoon fish on the screen gulps frantically and swims away, yelling “Pret our ce soir!” over his shimmery shoulder at a few of his undersea pals. Rubbing the gritty sleep from my blue eyes, I sit up on the lumpy, tan sofa and watch the French cartoon for a few moments before my sleepy mind comes to the conclusion that I’d seen the episode before. I stretch my softly tanned arms over my head, then stifling a yawn I stand and shuffle my way into the adjoining room.

 

The kitchen is very bright with its white tile floor, gleaming silver appliances, and four large windows letting in the early morning sunshine. The spicy, sweet smell of homemade cinnamon rolls is exhaled from the heated oven and is mixing pleasantly with the fresh, clean scent of laundry that is coming from the open laundry room door. But the one that made my young face break into a smile was the most significant scent to my childish mind, and demanded my attention. Looking over to my left I see the long wooden computer desk with its many shelves pressed into the corner of the room with my father perched in front of the flashing computer screen. Dressed in his usual attire of broken in blue jeans and a red flannel shirt, his bright blue eyes so similar to mine are focused on the screen and his shiny hair such a dark shade of brown that it appears black is combed neatly. Up close the smell of his cologne is even stronger, it clings to him and his clothes and for some reason always makes me feel at home.

 

I laugh to myself and deciding to get a closer look at what he is doing, I quietly sneak up on him. I stand behind him now, so small that I can just barely peek over his slim shoulders at what he is doing. As a part of his early morning ritual my dad always checks his email and responds to the necessary ones, which is what he was doing now. I however, being too young to even begin to comprehend the complex words he was using, focused on the computer’s keyboard where my dad was swiftly typing out his message. As I watched his fingers speed over the keys (as quick as lightning I thought!) my adolescent mind began to see my father in a new light.

 

I had never had the opportunity to watch someone other than my dad type before so in all honesty, I thought he was the only one who could possibly be so quick with his fingers. What I found even more astonishing was that he could do all this spectacular typing without even removing his eyes from the computer screen, and without a single mistake! My clear blue eyes steadily became bigger and bigger in that moment as my dad transformed. As naive as this may sound, my dad quite literally became my hero. No, he wasn't like superman or batman flying around and combating criminals to protect people from harm but he was my own superhero. My silent marveling had taken less than two minutes, and by then my presence had been detected. Turning to glance over his shoulder at me, my dad smiled gently “Good morning pumpkin.” I smiled shyly back before standing on my tip toes to hug him around his neck. After returning my embrace, he turned back to the computer screen to finish the message and I continued to hover behind him. It went on like this for several more moments before it finally became awkward for him, “I made cinnamon rolls for breakfast, why don’t you sit at the table and eat some while I finish up here?” I frowned slightly; I had forgotten how much he hated for people to hang over his shoulders watching him. Knowing that he meant well and that I would soon have warm, delicious cinnamon rolls filling my belly prevented me from feeling down for too long. I skipped over to the heavy, wooden kitchen table and sat down with a thump as my daddy set a plate of gooey cinnamon rolls in front of me. Taking the first bite, I closed my eyes and reveled in its glory. The sticky, sweet filling exploded in my mouth. The taste of sugared icing with a spicy hint of cinnamon was the perfect combination, especially when chased down by a big drink of cool, creamy milk. As I was chewing I turned my chair around so that I could face my dad while he typed, it still struck me as incredible.

 

Several years later, I entered the 6^th grade and as part of the requirements I was taking a computer class. The goal of the class was to educate the students about the parts of the computer among other things, but the main idea was for all of us to leave at the end of the term with the ability to type correctly, and without looking at the keyboard.  It’s no surprise that after the great interest I took in my dad’s typing that I was encouraged to do my best in the class so that maybe I could be as first-rate as my dad. I am now years past that time of hanging over my daddy’s shoulder and watching him type, I never lost that amazement with the art of typing though. I have made sure to practice frequently and I am just as good as my father now. I am an exceptionally quick typer and I can instinctively notice my mistakes and correct them; all without having to read over them on the computer screen. I don’t know if this is from the computer class, or maybe it’s just from all those early Saturday mornings spent perched beside my dad watching him type his way to becoming a superhero, performing a show for his own little blue eyed admirer.