Tense

The therapist works my neck. Do you have a hero I ask. Does it have to be someone famous she replies. No, I say. Then my dad. My dad is my hero she says. After my parents divorced and my mom moved to Minnesota, he took care of me. I was in high school. He was retired. Older and around. Today he's 72. More fit than me. I sit eating cereal while he does sit-ups. He lives in Maine. He stays here during the summer and rides his bike for miles, like 10 miles or more every day. I can ask him anything and get a fair answer. I can't tell her age, but she is young, a child from her father's second marriage. His first wife died she says. I tell her something about my father. He died years ago. Sometimes all I want to do is nothing with him I say. She works my right arm, holding it up. Relax, she says, it's hard to do when you're talking.