Saturday's Storyteller: "Dad never wore a tie on a Sunday. Until one day, he did."
by Belinda Roddie Dad never wore a tie on a Sunday. Until one day, he did. He came down the stairs with a frayed strip of tie dye zipping down his sternum, somehow working brilliantly with his stark white dress shirt, nearly catching the light of the ceiling lamp as he sat down for his weekend oatmeal. "Um, honey..." Mom had stopped stirring her coffee. She stared silently at my father, who said nothing at first, until he noticed how rigid his wife's fingers were against the sterling silver spoon. "If you don't stir your sugar enough, it'll settle on the bottom and make your coffee grainy," he commented, before picking up the Datebook section of the Chronicle. I had just settled into my corner chair at the table, tearing the shell bit by bit off my hardboiled egg, and knew exactly what my father was up to. For the first time in three years, he was going to church. His older brother was in town after quite the hiatus, and the only way to tri