I could have never imagined I would be here looking at you, like this, your small brown body compressed by time, bow legged, a somewhat stereotypical old-ish man. You were a bit hunched however, you walked kind of like you had just shit your pants. I was perplexed by this new contortion of your body. Your scalp was sun spotted and you had some prominent gray shoulder hairs protruding from the orange t-shirt you wore. Your skin was blacker than I had ever seen it, undoubtedly baked by the Canary sun. Your beard was completely gray. Where there used to be taught skin encasing wiry muscle, your arms now looked like scaffolding for loose sheets of wrinkled flesh. Your fingers were beginning to become unruly at the joints. They twisted themselves in uncomfortable directions as if fed up with a lifetime of servitude, a lifetime of scales, etudes, bebop lics, standards, Miles, Coltrane, Monk, Metheny. A lifetime of cooking, cleaning, holding your sons, breaking windows, breaking faces. I don’t blame them, I couldn't bear it either, I'd be twisted up after all that too.

 It was afternoon. We arrived at the airport Tenerife Del Sur and I was oddly calm. I expected a much more dramatic greeting, that there would be tears, maybe an intense embrace. Or perhaps, we might stand off like old adversaries, nemesis squaring for the final showdown on this desert island on the other side of the Atlantic. With my sidekick, my friend, my helper, my lover, my partner, my “unclear who you are to me ultimately, but it's working for now”, with Laura cheering me on, we would stand on opposite sides of the narrow reception hall, I by Ryanair and you by the Cicar car rental desk. We would hurl insults to start and as they echoed across the terminal, we’d stride possessed through the miasma of red faced German tourists. We would come to blows, just like that one time, but I would win; you would be on the floor, the grease of your face smearing the brilliantly polished tiling. I would lord over you, squeezing your puny pathetic sun spotted scalp between my ribcage and bulging bicep, You would not be able to breathe, you would be afraid, powerless, you would hurt, and I would whisper in your ear “don’t you ever fuck with me again” as you quivered. 

But of course none of this happened, it went something more like sleep deprived, our bodies all mixed up in a tangle on the hard plastic seats, Laura trying desperately to position her neck pillow so that she might rest unencumbered by that dutifully angular furniture in Lisboa terminal two. Something more like, we went stumbling across the world delirious, and met you hunched next to your overly smiley girlfriend, met you by the arrivals door where I mumbled “hi, nice to see you after fifteen years”. In short, it was anticlimactic. And among the squeaky white linoleum with its fake marbling, the tropical sun stupendously beaming , I was not impressed by this situation. We walked out onto the fresh black asphalt of the passenger parking area. There were some palm trees gingerly wriggling. I was wriggling too, my own catatonic sway over the scorching pavement. We got to Shawna’s little car. We were exchanging pleasantries and I offered to sit in the backseat but you refused, insisted that I go up front to stretch out my long legs, because you are probably shorter these days–true.  I had never liked the chamisa, they seemed diminutive, undeserving of treehood, and their smell on the hot summer wind had always offended me as a child. But as the stunted brown shrubbery of Tenerife whizzed by, I was reminded of my old home, and you, and our apartment on Paseo de Peralta. Then we were passing an enormous red mound jutting into the sea, you explained that there had been rampant geological activity in the recent past so this part of the island was covered in red volcanic rock. This is right around when Shawna started talking about fairies and I stopped listening. 

We arrived at the airbnb you had reserved for us with grandma's insurance settlement. It was a gorgeous unit with Spanish doors that opened up to a view of the startlingly blue water at the port of Los Abrigos some twenty yards away. As the owner was explaining all the various amenities and functions of the apartment, I could not overcome a sense of confused awe at the particulars of your adult life. You left Scientology. You left your mother. You left my mother. You tried leaving this earth twice.You all had met on Facebook. You lived in a cozy apartment overlooking the ocean, with two dogs and two cats, together for ten years., made this same journey a decade prior, to stay on a Spanish colonial territory with a complete stranger. And it worked. How absolutely preposterous. 

The rest of that afternoon is hazy, I remember laying around with Laura, she asked me how I felt, I said I didn't know. We had arrived on the 20th of April, your birthday, so we were due to be back up for dinner after a nap. Rest I never quite settled into, so when dinner time arrived, and we sat at the restaurant, and I irritably watched you shovel beans into your mouth with your thumb and listened to the smacking of your lips as you chewed noisily, watched you guzzle and consume, I felt some tired mixture of pity, disgust, and fascination. Looking past your bald scalp at the sun bathed road leading up from the beach side restaurant, I wondered what about me would withstand the years. What obstinate qualities would cling to me through the threshing machine of time? Would I too eat so fucking loudly and obnoxiously at sixty five? Or would I carry forth more subtle qualities into my golden years, for example, my love of fart jokes. These and other profound considerations ambled through my mind, meanwhile something else was fomenting.

  The rest of the trip proceeded smoothly, mundanely even. There were no explosions, no harsh words, no broken plates, or glasses, or faces. I had what some would call a "nice time". When we left, you said “thanks so much for coming to visit man and perhaps you can stay for longer next time”. We hugged awkwardly. "yeah totally," I smiled warmly, as I thought about if I really wanted to make this trip again. I am still not sure. However, after several months, some of the callus seems to have receded. Maybe it was the move to New York, maybe I took off some old layers, an old coat that no longer suited the weather. I remember through the summer after our trip, wanting to talk to you, wanting your advice, missing you even, a feeling reserved for friends and lovers, but for parents, not since I was a small child. I remember saying “I love you dad” for the first time since you left, words that felt foreign and strange in my mouth, but sincere all the same. And so miraculously, I see you on Skype and I adore your ridiculous shoulder hairs peeking out from beneath your shirt. I chuckle with complete magnanimity at the thought of your beautiful smacking noisy mouth when you eat. I am neither impressed, nor embarrassed by you. I do not fear you, nor do I wish you harm. I don't even wish things could have been different, at least, very rarely. You get to be, at last, dethroned, just human, just a man, just like me.