Regrets

One day I sat with my father out on the patio in the backyard where I played as a child. And on this very patio he had helped me build my first darkroom. He told me a story about how his father, my grandfather, had asked him to help cut his toe-nails. My father said to me that he refused. He said it in such a way that I could tell that this was a great regret of his. I clipped my father’s toe-nails as well as his finger nails, I bathed him after I had changed his adult diapers and I shaved his grizzly whiskers which I knew he really appreciated...knowing that my regrets were so much more grave.