The Perfect Stone

My father always liked skipping stones.

An aerospace engineer, we would often find him deep in thought, unaware of the world around him. Skipping stones was different though, he said it made him feel present. Growing up, he would often take my younger brother and I with him to the lake and skip some stones, just as his father had done with him when he was growing up. Some of the closest held memories I have are of the early mornings that my younger brother and I would spend helping him find stones to skip at the lake near our childhood home. We would wake up in the morning and he would make us breakfast, then he would grab his old Lowe's bucket and we would walk down to the lake. Once we were there, we would help him sift through the rocks and throw them in that Lowe's bucket until it was filled about halfway, then we would get to skipping. Dad could get it to skip nine or ten times, but we never could get more than two, maybe three, and we would end up just watching my dad do it instead. As we got older we did it less and less, but he would continue to do it by himself, even after we had grown up and moved away.

My father never did anything half assed, and that included skipping stones. Though it was a pastime for him, he couldn't help himself from putting his mind to work, just a little. If his bucket was empty and he needed some stones to skip, he would walk along the shore for a little bit, hunting for the ones that fit the strict criteria he had put together. He could skip most stones, but in his opinion, a great skipping stone had uniform thickness, was right around ¼" thick, 3 to 8 ounces in weight, could fit in his palm, was extremely smooth with a flat bottom, and depending on the weather and the condition of the lake, he might be more drawn to a triangular, a circular, or a squared shape stone. You might think that's a lot to keep in mind, but it wasn't like he was out there with a ruler and a scale. He used this old stone that he had found a long time ago as a reference. He said it was the Perfect Skipping Stone.

My father had kept that stone with him for as long as I could remember. I honestly don't remember him ever not having it. When I was looking for stones with him he would hand it to me so I knew what a good skipping stone would look and feel like. He would tell me that we were looking for ones just like that. I'd hold it in my hand, rubbing it between my fingers, feeling the weight of it, and I remember thinking that it was the smoothest rock I had ever felt. Whether it was that smooth when he first found it, or if he had slowly smoothed it down over the course of all those years, I couldn't tell you, but what I could tell you is where it was kept, as it was never too far.

My father kept it in a little wooden boat that was on the entryway table by the front door. It was the same place where he would drop his wallet and keys when he got home, and he always took it with him when we went out. He would drop it in his left hand pocket. I can remember him taking it out at times, like when we were waiting for food at a restaurant, or walking around at Costco, and just holding it. He would rub his index finger and his thumb and then hold it, as he did just before he would skip a rock, before dropping it back in his pocket.

It's funny, we called it my Dad's skipping stone, and my father had said that it was the perfect stone for skipping, but he never got the chance to skip it, so in a way, it was just a stone. I had asked him once if he was ever going to skip it and his response was that if he ever found a better stone, then he would skip it, but until then, that this was his as good as it gets, and he'd use it for reference. That had made sense to me, though I had always wondered how far it would go if and when he ever did decide to skip it. I remember asking him that question a total of one time. It was a sunny, summer day, and I was searching for stones with my dad as the day was just getting started. I had to have been maybe five or six years old at the time and I had been watching my dad pick up a stone and compare it to his stone for the thousandth time before asking him,

"Hey Dad."

"Yes Son?"

"How far do you think you could skip that stone?"

"This one?" He asked, shaking the one he had just picked up.

"No! Not that one! Your stone!"

He took a second and studied it again before responding, "A rock this smooth, this perfect? Hmmm."

He scratched his chin as he looked hard at the rock, twisting and flipping it around, as I waited in anticipation.

"If I were to skip this stone, I am not sure it would stop."

I looked at him, wondering if he was pulling my leg or not as he continued,

"Unless an outside force stepped in and stopped it, I think that once I let this one loose, it would probably just keep going and going."

"Wow! Really?" I asked, eyes wide.

"I think that if I could throw it just right, it would skip across the whooooole lake and hit the other side of it."

I stared at him a bit longer, as my eyes looked at the rock, and then at the lake, and I truly believed him. I finally stopped staring at him when he smiled at me, and we both went back to looking for rocks.

I realize in sharing this it might sound like my father was obsessed with skipping stones, but in all actuality it was a pretty small part of our lives. It was, at most, a hobby; a way he would spend some of his free time, or a place where his mind could wander. It was something he would do on the weekend, and only became a part of his morning routine once he had retired. He was never interested in trying to turn it into a challenge or a competition. He just liked skipping stones.

When he passed away last year, it had been after two years of battling colon cancer. Luckily, in a way, we had all been in town for Thanksgiving for the first time in years when things started to take a turn for the worse. We had snuck in one last mostly normal Thanksgiving meal together and looking back now, my father must have known it was coming. We had talked about the not so fun stuff a while back when he was first diagnosed so we didn't have to talk about any of it then. We sat around and enjoyed each other's company, soaking in each other's presence.

The day that my father passed away, he was at home, and it was peaceful. My mother, my brother, and I were all huddled around him and we cried and held each other tightly as he left this planet. He had been my hero all my life. It's weird being grown now thinking about heroes. The thing about heroes growing up is that you normally don't think too much about them dying, like actually dying. But in the end, at some point or another, all heroes die. Well, the real ones do.

The day after my father's funeral my brother and I woke up early and drank a cup of coffee together in the silence of our childhood home while my mother slept upstairs. It was a surprisingly clear and bright early December morning and I asked my brother if he wanted to go skip some stones down by the lake, for Dad. It took a little convincing from me, but we got dressed and prepared to walk down to the lake. As we were getting ready to leave I looked at the little wooden boat that my father had kept his wallet and keys in. Sitting with them was something that I hadn't thought about yet, something that hadn't been discussed over a hard conversation, or joked about light heartedly, it was something that hadn't been mentioned at all. It was the skipping stone, my father's perfect skipping stone. It was in there with his wallet and keys still, just waiting for my dad to come and grab them. Instead, I grabbed it and held it in my palm, then I ran my fingers over it. I felt the weight in my hand. It was familiar, it was smooth, but it was cold. It had never felt it cold before. It had always carried my father's warmth.

We grabbed the old Lowe's bucket from the garage, still filled with a dozen or so rocks in it, all ripe for the skipping. One last gift from Dad. On the walk to the lake I got an idea, and I ran it by my brother. I asked him if we should keep the stone, or if we wanted to skip it at the lake, together. We didn't know what to do, and my father wasn't around to ask. He had told me that once he found a better rock he would skip it, but he never did. I wasn't sure if this was a moment where we accepted the torch being passed, or a time to put this stone to rest, knowing that there was never going to be a better skipping stone than this one. That our father had truly found the most perfect skipping stone, and that it was time to see what it could do.

By the time we had arrived at the lake we still hadn't decided, and we ended up finding some more rocks ourselves and throwing them in the bucket with the ones that my father had already picked, then it was time to skip them. It was a beautiful morning. The mountains shone in the distance and the lake stood still, as if it was holding its breath. It was cold enough we could see ours push out after every throw. Eventually, my brother and I were both out of rocks, well, except for one. We looked at each other and I pulled my father's stone out of my pocket and handed it to my brother. He held it up, inspecting it, flipping it around and holding it like he was about to skip it, then he grasped it tightly and said,

"You should do it." he said.

"Are you sure? I don't mind." I replied.

"I'd really like you to do it." He said and he placed it in my hand.

"Okay." I closed my hand around the stone and felt the warmth my brother had passed from his hands onto mine. I rubbed it between my thumb and my palm as I stepped up to the water, turned myself slightly sideways, wound my arm back, and threw it as hard as I could, as straight as I could, right down the middle of the lake.

Bloink!

Bloink!

Bloink!

We watched it bounce off the water again and again.

Bloink!

Bloink!

Bloink!

It seemed to keep the same pace as it got further and further away from us.

Bloink!

Bloink!

Bloink!

My brother and I kept our eyes fixed as it continued to skip even further.

Bloink!

Bloink!

Bloink!

It showed no signs of slowing; If anything, it was going faster, the sound of it skipping getting quieter now. We were in disbelief.

bloink...

bloink...

bloink...

We couldn't even see it now. I looked at my brother.

"Do you see it?"

He squinted his eyes and nodded his head, watching the other side of the lake.

"Yeah, it's still going."

I strained my eyes and my ears, but I couldn't see it. The sound of the stone skipping across the water becoming a whisper. We could hardly hear it as it moved further and further away…

bloink…

bloink…

bloink…

Then, as my brother and I stood there, alone together, we heard a clack that echoed around the lake as the stone reached the other side.