My father froze when he saw his professor washing cars.
asserted
professor → freeze → cars
It was 1962, and Zafar Nomani was a visiting teacher at Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kan., newly arrived from India on a fellowship.
asserted
Nomani → visit → fellowship
One day, riding past a church car wash, he spotted his professor among the people scrubbing down cars beside his students.
asserted
he → rid → students
For the rest of his life, my father treasured that moment.
asserted
father → treasure → moment
"I saw the dignity of labor," he would tell us.
asserted
he → see → us
More than six decades later, on this Labor Day weekend, my family is mourning my father, who died in early August at the age of 93 in our adopted hometown of Morgantown, W.Va.
asserted
who → mourn → Morgantown
And as I negotiate new relationships with his power washer, his weed trimmer, his tools and the daily chores that he quietly managed, pushing a cart at our local Kroger on Patterson Avenue, I find myself reliving – and rewriting – the story of my life with him.
asserted
myself → negotiate → him
For most of my life, I thought I was challenging the patriarchy.
asserted
I → think → patriarchy
Now I realize I grew and became the investigative journalist that I am because of the patriarch in my life.
asserted
I → realize → life
Living a Philosophy of Gratitude: 'I Get To...'
I arrived in America from India in the summer of 1969 as a 4-year-old girl and I grew up in the 1970s with feminism, women’s rights and Gloria Steinem, who died this week at 92, just a year younger than my father.
asserted
who → live → father
I learned to interrogate male power, religious authority and the restrictions that societies imposed on women.
asserted
societies → learn → women
I still believe in the work of empowering women and girls.
asserted
I → believe → women
But in my father's absence, I have come to understand something I failed to fully appreciate while he was alive: the quiet and largely invisible power of a good patriarch.
asserted
he → come → patriarch
I spent much of my life believing my strength came from resisting my father’s authority; after his death, as I grieve his absence from this world, I recognize that much of my strength, intellect and purpose came from the invisible labor he performed to make my independence possible.
asserted
independence → spend → labor
I thought I was overcoming the patriarch; I now see that – with his devoted and beloved wife beside him – my father was performing the quiet service that allowed me to become the woman capable of challenging him.
asserted
me → think → him
That epiphany has also changed the meaning of "labor" for me.
asserted
epiphany → change → me
Labor, I now understand, isn't just the work we perform from 9 to 5, as Dolly Parton, another national treasure lost this summer, sang.
asserted
Parton → understand → 5
Some of the most important labor of our lives is never entered on a time sheet.
asserted
Some → enter → sheet
It is the ordinary caregiving through which people provide one another shelter, safety, security.
asserted
people → provide → security
This summer, for two months, I helped care for my father with my family in hospital rooms at our local hospital.
asserted
I → care → hospital
His last breath came in Room 8.
asserted
breath → come → Room
Amid the oxygen tubes, medications, alarms and fear, I fell in love with my father all over again.
asserted
I → fall → father
I resurrected the spirit of the girl who once lay against his belly listening to stories about the kings and queens of India.
asserted
who → resurrect → India
I remembered the girl who arrived in the U.S.
asserted
who → remember → U.S.
At the time, my father was a Ph.D. student and our family lived in poverty in graduate-student housing in Piscataway, N.J., in a humble red two-bedroom home converted from military barracks on Bevier Road.
asserted
family → live → Road
In the winters, my parents turned on the oven to heat the home.
asserted
parents → turn → home
But my parents still found a way to throw me a birthday party in our backyard.
asserted
parents → find → backyard
The grievances and misunderstandings that accumulated over a lifetime fell away.
asserted
that → accumulate → lifetime
What remained was the gratitude my father had modeled for me through the way he lived his life.
asserted
he → remain → life
His philosophy was not "I have to," but "I get to."
asserted
I → have → ?
My father never lived from the premise that life had victimized him.
asserted
life → live → him
He didn't organize his days around the complaints of "I have to..."
asserted
I → organize → complaints
I have to work.
asserted
I → have → ?
I have to study.
asserted
I → have → ?
I have to take care of my family.
asserted
I → have → family
His philosophy was exactly the opposite: the gratitude of "I get to..." I get to.
asserted
I → get → ?
I get to work.
asserted
I → get → ?
I get to study.
asserted
I → get → ?
I get to take care of my family.
asserted
I → get → family
That philosophy had been forged long ago in his response to adversity and suffering.
asserted
philosophy → forge → adversity
…and 137 more, not listed.
The Aporia
