Sweet Rolls

Sweet Rolls

5:30 a.m. arrives early, especially for a twelve-year-old, but Mom had me up, if not fully awake, and in the kitchen settled over my breakfast cereal by that time. We were going fishing. It was one of the weekends I would spend time with my Dad.

I cried when Mom told me of the divorce. I didn't know what that meant. I was nine when it happened. I knew it meant that Dad would no longer live with us, but I didn't understand why. He wasn't going to be around much anymore.

Divorce is a process for adults. There is a period where the relationship breaks down, followed by a decision to separate, followed by the necessary legal procedures to dissolve the union. For children divorce occurs in one day. One day your parents are together, the next day they aren't. Children don't see the why, only the what.

It was harder on my older brother Roger. He was 14 at the time. After Mom told him about the divorce, he went into his room and closed the door. During the course of the evening he crawled out of his bedroom window and disappeared with our dog. He was gone for three hours. I'm not sure how it affected my sister. She was already married and living with her own family by then. I cried.

Dad and I would spend weekends together after that, Saturdays especially. During the summer he would take his two sons up to Grandpa's place in Upsala, Minnesota. When Roger developed other interests, Dad and I would make the trip alone. There I would spend hours in Grandpa's car listening to the radio and pretending to drive. It was a 1955 Oldsmobile Ninety-Eight, blue and white. We would also go fishing on Cedar Lake across from Amy's cabins.

One year, Dad purchased an old outboard motor for our annual trip. We always rented a boat, but rowing limited our options. Sunfish, crappies, perch, and bass were possible catches, if you could get to the right spots, but the lake was immense, and the good spots were some distance from the docks. Walleye and Northern you had to troll for.

The outboard sputtered and coughed. It looked old from the first day I saw it. It was a stained metallic gray, yet it worked. Now we could hit all of the good fishing spots and we could troll regularly. I had my own small tackle box, and a Johnson closed face spin casting reel on a fiberglass Zeber rod. We used red Dare Devil spoons, and lures that looked like little fish which wiggled when you pulled them through the water. We jigged for bass, used worms for sunfish, and trolled for Walleye and Northern. We always caught something, usually a little Perch. Those where dumb fish.

One summer, Dad spent most of his two-week vacation in Grandpa's basemen trying to get the outboard motor to stop stalling. He never succeeded, at least on that trip.

We would also take short trips, day trips to one of the many lakes around Minneapolis. Lake Minnetonka was one place we'd go. Today we where heading up to Medicine Lake, in northern Hennepin County. Dad was coming to pick me up at 6:00 a.m. that's why Mom had me up at 5:30 a.m..

We piled into the Studebaker and drove north.Until that day, I had never realized how big Hennepin County was. It took an long time to reach our destination. Main roads turned into county roads which turned into country roads. My impatience stemmed from something Dad said:

"I have a surprise for you", he said, "something special."

"What?" I asked.

"I'll show, you once we're on the lake," he said.

It took forever.

Once we arrived we loaded the boat and headed out onto the lake. It was still early. The air was cool and the dew still clung to the boat. I asked Dad about the surprise.

"Soon", he said.

"Not just yet," he said.

"Let's fish," he said.

Somewhere around 8:30 a.m. it was time. He pulled out his thermos and a brown paper bag.

"Here", he said, "this was made special."

Inside the bag was a huge sweet roll. That was his surprise: a sweet roll shared by father and son while still on the water. He split the sweet roll and poured two cups of hot coffee. I shared his gift in the cool of the morning, with no one else on earth. It seemed odd to me then. It still seems odd to me. A nice odd though.

I talked to Dad recently and asked him if he had done any fishing lately. "No", he said. "I haven't been fishing in over 20 years." He sold the outboard motor to someone else's father when I hit my mid teens and developed other interests. "I never did like to fish," he said.

Imagine that! All this time I thought he liked to fish. I know I did. I looked forward to those times spent fishing.

He still likes sweet rolls, I think. Every time I visit him in Mesa, Arizona, he has a batch of them ready for breakfast. Usually around 8:30 a.m. we'll sit in the kitchen and drink some coffee and split the sweet rolls. My daughters will join us, moving in and out of the kitchen to share in that time spent together. I think he likes sweet rolls, but I thought he liked to fish.

Divorce can be hard on kids. The trauma of two adults who once loved each other, brought now to such conflict that they feel they must separate, can easily spill over onto the children. Inevitably some of it will. It doesn't have to harm them permanently. Not if they can share a sweet roll while still on the water.

I think he likes sweet rolls.