…revealing a woman in her late sixties with kind eyes and a warm smile. She introduced herself as Martha, a close friend of my father’s whom I’d never met. She invited me in, and we sat down at a small wooden table in the cozy living room.
“Your father spoke highly of you, Frank,” Martha began, eyeing me with an understanding look. “He knew you chose a different path, but he was proud of you, nonetheless. He left something here for you.”
I was taken aback. My father was not a man to share his feelings openly, and to hear that he had been proud of me was both comforting and surprising. Martha walked over to a small cabinet, opening it with a key she wore around her neck. From it, she retrieved a worn leather-bound journal and handed it to me.
