Those things that ‘we always did,’ those things that we said were like traditions, likely only happened once. But that’s cool. The reason we remember it and recant the event is because it stuck out as being one of those moments that we wish had happened more often. But we are alright with that.
Those big hands were always rubbing through his crew cut hair, with a shake at the end, a smile, and a “remember this kid………” His father was part of a tribe, within a tribe, within a larger tribe. By simple demographics it was the whole 1966 suburban dad thing, inside of our whole subdivision which was a community in itself, and then the smaller group of immediate neighbors on our block. This is the group that “we always went to the Blackhawks game on the school bus from the local restaurant with,” once.
In the back he sat quietly because they were anything but. At that age, all you ever needed to do was smile genuinely, and say yes sir, or no thankyou Mr……, and they liked you plenty. Never ask for things and they would take care of you. Never lag behind the men when they walked, and never tell your mother things you heard. Simple. 
His father was a gentle sort, not one to use language, or speak of woman much. Certainly not like the others. But on these sorts of experiences he attempted to loosen up and fit in, not because he enjoyed that manly banter, quite the contrary, but he wanted his son, I think, to understand the world as it is, and not as we see on the television.
Crawling in between the familiar sheets late that night he thinks back on the game. He smells the smoke, the beer, the grime from the handrails spiraling up the concrete ramps, the butter, and the corn. The whole night can be smelt in his low cropped hair from the big hands of the men on the bus, from his block, in his neighborhood, who were just like his dad.
It was always like that, a tradition.
