How 3 Figs Helped Me Understand My Dad’s Love Language
His love language is unique
It’s a Sunday morning and as I wake up, I don’t want to leave the bed.
It’s going to be a difficult day. I’ll be flying back to London after visiting my parents for a week.
There are two things, wait, three things that happen without a miss in any of these flying-back days.
- I have a heated discussion with my parents about how much organic produce from their farm I can fit in my luggage.
- I end up leaving some of my clothes there trying to make space.
- My dad starts crying the second I step foot at the airport.
I’m not looking forward to any of them. But I need to get up. It’s my last day home, I want to make the most of it.
I go out into the garden and notice that my uncle is there having a coffee with my dad. I join them.
They are speaking about figs. I jump in the conversation and ask: “Are they done yet for this year?”
“Ah no, they need some more weeks.” — says my dad.
I make a sad face and reply: “Too bad, they are my favorite fruit.”
“Mine too!” — says my uncle.
“Do you remember when we were kids that we didn’t have figs but our neighbors had plenty of them?” — he asks my dad.
“Of course, we used to beg them every summer to give us some.” — says dad.
My dad, begging for something? That was a hard thing to picture. My dad is the proudest and most self-sufficient person I know.
“Until you got your first job when you were 12 years old and bought three fig trees for us to plant. And I planted them at the lower garden.” — adds my uncle.
There you go, that sounds more like my dad.
“After you started working many things changed for our family. Man, we grew up so poor, we had nothing. These kids these days have no idea how easy they have it, they are so spoiled and ungrateful.” — continues my uncle.
The conversation moves to analyzing today’s kids and I decide to go and start packing. I put what I think are mandatory for me and then go to the kitchen and show my mom the space I have left.
Her face would be less disappointed if I had told her that I had murdered someone.
Thank God it’s only her and dad isn’t around yet.
Where is dad by the way? My uncle looks to have left, but I can’t find dad.
I get on with adding to my luggage honey, olive oil, walnuts, hazelnut, herbs, tea, all kinds of homemade jams, and whatever are the vegetables and the fruits of the season. We fill it up and of course, I sacrifice a bunch of my clothes.
I complain annoyingly for like 10 minutes, make a whole speech about how we can buy everything in London, but then I just accept my fate.
An hour later, I am hanging out with our cat and dad finally shows up.
He comes to me and says: “These were the only ones which were almost done.” — and hands me three small figs.
“Yummy, thank you dad!” — I say as I eat them right away.
They aren’t very sweet, but they taste like heaven. My dad had spent over an hour searching, so I could try them for this year. There is nothing sweeter than that.
As my plane takes off, and I’m above the clouds, I think about the week I spent home, and that’s when it hits me.
I’m a spoiled and ungrateful kid.
How did I never understand why my dad wants to give me produce from their farm?
He doesn’t do it because he thinks I cannot get those things myself.
He does it because when he was little he didn’t have that. When he was little he had to beg to get some figs from the neighbors.
And now the thought that I have to pay for things that are in abundance in his farm makes him sad.
I used to think: “How can they not understand that I can buy all these things whenever I want?”
When the real question I should have asked is:
“How can I not understand that it’s not about things for them?
It’s about love. It’s loving your children so much that you want to give them everything you didn’t have.
They are only telling me that they love me.”
Thank God he wasn’t present to hear my complaints and “speech” today. But I wish I wasn’t on a plane now, so I could call him and say: “I love you too, dad!”
Or maybe, it’s a good thing that I am. Because I wouldn’t be able to hold my tears. And that would make him even more emotional in this day.
In my next trip though, I’m bringing zero clothes and the biggest luggage I have. After all, I have left plenty of clothes there, and I don’t actually need a lot of them.
But what I need, is a lot of space to receive my parents’ love.
