I am driving down a residential street on the way to my parent's place in Richfield. A funny out-of-place figure on a riding mower approaches. It's my dad.

He frantically motions me to stop. "Erin!" he says. "I'm on my way to the parade and I need you to get me a little television set or something." He points to an electrical socket on the mower. "To plug in!"

"You want a TV for your lawnmower?" I ask.

"It's not just some lawnmower," he says. "It's a Gravely tractor. And I need something to plug in so people can see."

I have been decoding Dadspeak for most of my life and know that this means: I need an electrical device that will demonstrate the modification I've made to this Gravely tractor. I want the Richfield Home Days Parade onlookers to see that it now includes a 120-volt AC generator, into which I may plug any number of items.

"You sure?" I say.

Since I am one rung above my father on the evolution scale, he does not wield the same translation powers I possess. Hence, he does not realize that I have just economized this: Do you really want a television? Surely a parade onlooker would delight in something with a little more flash.

Having misunderstood my perfectly clear response, Dad rolls his eyes and makes a big huff and says, "Oh, never mind. I'm already late!" which translates to: How disappointing. I surely thought my own daughter would have understood!

Dad sputters off. I drive down the street and pull up to my parent's house.

"Hey, mom," I say. "Can you get me a strand of Christmas lights?"

"Why?" she asks.

"Dad needs them for the lawnmower."

My parents have been married for 43 years. Mom has tolerated a basement teeming with band saws and lathes, vacuumed countless pounds of sawdust, and futilely lambasted a Suzuki dirt bike that once took up residence in the family room for two weeks. A string of Christmas lights for a lawnmower is small potatoes in her world. Hence, she does not ask, "Why do you want to give your father a string of Christmas lights for the lawnmower when the big guy in the red suit isn't due for months?" Instead her eyes light up. And, using my psychic Mom powers, I know she thinks: Aha! This is an easy win in the War Against Clutter - one less strand of useless mismatched lights your father won't let me throw away.

"Give me one second," she says. And in a blink she is schlepping a cardboard box marked "oddball lights" into the kitchen. "Take as many as you want."

I shuffle through and pull out a multicolored twinkling strand. "Be right back," I say, flying out the door.

I pull up next to Dad and hold up the lights.

He stops the mower and slumps with concession and says, "Aw Erin," but means: How dense of me to think that you wouldn't understand. And because you are you, my daughter, you brought a funny quirky string of blinking Christmas lights that is about ten thousand times more demonstrative than some ridiculous television.

And then he adds, "It's perfect," which means, I am sorry I doubted you.

And I say, "Meet you at the parade," while hoping he hears: I accept your apology, but next time, have a little faith, Dad.

I collect Mom and we settle upon our curbside blanket to watch the parade. The clanging fire trucks give way to the high school marching band. The Kiwanis go by with their line of flags. Majorettes, kids with decorated bikes, politicians in gleaming convertibles. Then come the guys with their tractors and riding lawn mowers and hit-n-miss engines.

Dad chugs by, laughing and waving from the seat of the Gravely, the only entry festooned with a strand of twinkling lights in the mid-August heat. We shake our heads and smile. "Your father," says Mom. We do not take a picture. After all, the image of Dad on a lawnmower is not unusual.

A few months later, something goes wrong. Severe chest pains and doctors lead to an emergency open-heart surgery. The story does not end happily. Suddenly, Dad is gone.

The time comes to sell his Gravely and hand tools and drill presses. Men who look a lot like Dad populate the associated auction. They smile and lean back and scratch their chins.

"Would you look at that?" they muse. "This guy put a 120-volt AC generator on this Gravely tractor." They do not understand why I cast my head down and quickly walk away.

That was five years ago. Every year, the season of lights and cheer comes upon us. I step through it with thanks for the people around me, and sorrow for those to whom I've said goodbye. My family practices the standard traditions, with trees and ribbons and shining ornaments. And gifts.

Wrappings will give way on Christmas morning to delight and surprise, but the echoes of a parade long since past, the memory of an old tractor and the strand of lights that still tethers me to Dad, these are the true gifts: rare yet invisible, small yet eternal.

eobnow@cox.net; erin-obrien.blogspot.com

DADDY O'BRIEN Do you own his Gravely tractor?