I used to take off his boots at the end of the day. I didn’t look forward to it, but Dad had a lot of fun with it and we’d smile at each other. They’d thud even on the carpet, and I’d pull their leash into the closet. I didn’t know where he’d been, mostly adventures on our little farm in the mountains of North Carolina, repairing fences to keep in the goats, or pouring concrete slap for the pig pin. Or dusted with green from mowing the lawn.

I just plopped my boots in my own closet, in my own house, thousands of miles away from my father.

I got this pair of Doc Martin boots free while I was on The Real World. They aren’t the punk kickers I had when I was in high school, but wallet-brown leather work boots. The trademark yellow stitching lets me know they aren’t just any work boots. These boots have been through it all. I stepped on elephant crap in Africa, waded through Mardi Gras muck, painted a vandalized church in Mexico, and now they are keep cactus from piercing my feet as I trudge through the desert.

Dad’s house was a farm house in the mountains. He’d never have crazy paintings on his walls, and my living room has more chrome than his garage. He had shaggy hair and a beard, and I have stiff spikes. But at the end of the day, he rests his crucifix on his nightstand, just like I do.