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5. Lessons from my Father

Written Wednesday, April 8, 2020 / Day 240 / Noon

This day marks one month since I ended hostilities with the future (Volume 7 - Essay #12 “Cease Fire”). As I reflect on what that all means I have been drawn to the thoughts of what that future might be. Of course, I have no idea what that will be, so instead I have focused on what it seems I will need going forward.

One of the elements that speaks to me is strength. I have never had the strength in my life I thought I should have possessed.

I was never really a strong person. My personality is not a dominant one. When I enter a room, nothing much changes in the room, where with some the entire atmosphere can change. “Look, it is [whoever it is]!”, they might say - and all of a sudden the mood changes. I’ve never really had that much of an impact.

And when I think of the times in my life where I have taken difficult stands, I have always persevered in those decisions, yet not in a demonstrable or eloquent way. I have taken my stands and held to them. But those moments would not be portrayed as entertaining or poignant as I would have dreamed they would be.

Looking to the future then, I see I will need to be stronger in this new life. Through the incredible moments of this past month, I do find I have a confidence about what has happened that propels me more than I have ever had previously.

In looking into my past, I am looking for where there was strength in my life. I have been invariably drawn back to my Father. He was neither flamboyant nor overbearing. He was like so many of his day, he worked hard and in his limited ways, pursued his dreams.

As an only child, I grew up around adults. In my day, the neighborhood kids were my family in a sense. We played and played in our neighborhood each day. When night approached and our mothers called us home, we resisted until most of the group was gone and we were left by ourselves and had to finally, reluctantly go in.

In my era, as opposed to today where there is so much knowledge and instruction, there were not a lot of direct instructions from my parents. They took care of us but direct teaching just was not a part of our lives.

Now looking back however, I do see their lessons quite well. And for the most part, they were powerful as examples always are. In that way they are a part of me.

Thankfully, what they embraced in certain areas never touched me. They were smokers and social drinkers (wine with a mixer that they had most days). My Dad liked horse racing and was a regular at several tracks. I spent many times with him, never really getting the racing (or betting) bug in me but enjoying the spectacle of it all - and of course he would buy me hamburgers and fries!

My Father had a background he rarely shared. His Navy experience in World War II on a destroyer - working with the big guns - a topic that rarely surfaced - and then only in the most general way.

My Dad grew up in a home with sisters from his Stepmothers first marriage. He never talked much about them. His birth mother abruptly left the family when he was a small boy. A curious time that he never really understood or was enlightened about.

At 16, his father enrolled him in the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC’s) to plant trees in Maine. It was one of those programs created during the depression era. At 18, his father enlisted him in the Navy. He never talked of his relationship with his father - it seemed a bit harsh from the little I knew.

Ultimately, his Father committed suicide over an event that we could only guess was the real motivation.

But my Dad was always there in my life. He was a worker. As the least articulate person in the sense of public speaking, he had a career as a salesman - one in which you would think speaking would be helpful. Yet he was successful at it just the same. He did not like to be in an office - so the world became his office.

Some of the most comforting times were those I could go “work with him”. Which meant driving around with him to his various destinations at which he tended to the business he was a part of.

I can only recollect a few days in my life where he would be home ‘sick”. And those times were for issues that made him immobile (one was an infection in his foot that became a problem). Other than those times - his resolve to work was a pillar in his life.

He was a thinker as he would say. He had ideas for inventions that he pursued. There were so many of them. One of his ideas - for a springless plastic valve to be used on a shaker, say for salt or any powder type of item, brought him to cut up my mother’s Tupperware lids to get the plastic he needed. That was the invention for which he obtained a patent. Something I was always proud that he achieved. It was one of those successes someone from his background rarely accomplished.

Even though my mother typed (on the old manual typewriter) countless letters to companies to pitch the valve, nothing ever came of those efforts. A failure? Perhaps. But an example? Yes. Absolutely yes.

He acted like a person who had resources - although he didn’t. That got him into financial trouble with people and family members who because of those issues were lost to me growing up.

His models in his life, from what I can surmise, were not all that great. Yet despite all of that he provided me a solid foundation in which I could grow. His examples of work, pursuing his dreams and pure drive becoming part of what I would become.

I am thankful to God that I did not succumb to his other examples that were also a part of my life. I consider that was part of God’s guidance. Often, when we look back at our lives, we can sometimes see more clearly about the choices we made. We can see them more clearly after the fact than when we were living those moments.

My mother had died before him. We had moved to Virginia and I often feel moments of sadness that he faced being alone on his own as I can now so deeply understand. Having tasted of that well of sadness - I get a retroactive twinge for what he might have faced.

My parents drifted apart towards the end of their lives - it was always sad. Sad because of their story.

He pursued her. One story was that he would wait outside her apartment and walk her to work every day. I have but a few written artifacts of the love he lavished on her. I’m not sure it was reciprocal - she often stated that with all of his affections towards her she thought he would make a good husband. I was never sure if there was a real deep love there. As having experienced that and so much more in my life - looking back to their marriage often makes me a bit sad.

After her death, I remember him saying quite often that he reflected on her good points. How good she was. Some of that original love perhaps showing itself in his later life? His comments revealing a sensitivity I had never seen in him in that way before.

He looked at life in a quirky way - often I am reminded in my life at how I seem to have some of that perspective in how I see things. Not sure if that is genetic but the proclivity is certainly interesting.

At the end of his life, he did something that I am forever proud of him for accomplishing. He was alone in this - my being out of town was always something that haunted me. One of those side-effects of our moving to Virginia that I have had to make peace with over the years.

My parents, as I had mentioned, were both quite consistent drinkers. Something I had never embraced or felt compelled to do.

He was, now in hindsight, something called a “passive alcoholic”. Someone who is not prone to violence when they excessively drink. Oddly, as a child, it is something I never really noticed. In my teen years, I was a bit more vocal about both of their patterns of drinking - not that it had any effect at the time.

But towards the end of his life, as it is more clearly seen in retrospect, he checked himself into the VA Hospital in Buffalo. As it turned out, this was about a month and a half before he died of secondary issues of bladder cancer.

As part of his stay, he enrolled in the Alcoholics Anonymous program. Although he did not have that much time left, he took a step. And although he didn’t live to see the total fulfillment of that step - what he did then has been something that has always encouraged me. His last act on this earth - a positive one to address a life-long problem.

As I stand on the threshold of this new life that God has decided I will have, It is these lessons from my Father that I want to remember and make a part of every day I live going forward.

I know that the best of him is a part of me.

Just like my Father in heaven is going to ensure that the best of Him and His strength is in me each day of this new life He has ordained for me to live.

5. Lessons from my Father

Written Wednesday, April 8, 2020 / Day 240 / Noon

One of the elements that speaks to me is strength. I have never had the strength in my life I thought I should have possessed.

Looking to the future then, I see I will need to be stronger in this new life. Through the incredible moments of this past month, I do find I have a confidence about what has happened that propels me more than I have ever had previously.

In looking into my past, I am looking for where there was strength in my life. I have been invariably drawn back to my Father. He was neither flamboyant nor overbearing. He was like so many of his day, he worked hard and in his limited ways, pursued his dreams.

In my era, as opposed to today where there is so much knowledge and instruction, there were not a lot of direct instructions from my parents. They took care of us but direct teaching just was not a part of our lives.

Now looking back however, I do see their lessons quite well. And for the most part, they were powerful as examples always are. In that way they are a part of me.

My Father had a background he rarely shared. His Navy experience in World War II on a destroyer - working with the big guns - a topic that rarely surfaced - and then only in the most general way.

My Dad grew up in a home with sisters from his Stepmothers first marriage. He never talked much about them. His birth mother abruptly left the family when he was a small boy. A curious time that he never really understood or was enlightened about.

Ultimately, his Father committed suicide over an event that we could only guess was the real motivation.

Some of the most comforting times were those I could go “work with him”. Which meant driving around with him to his various destinations at which he tended to the business he was a part of.

I can only recollect a few days in my life where he would be home ‘sick”. And those times were for issues that made him immobile (one was an infection in his foot that became a problem). Other than those times - his resolve to work was a pillar in his life.

Even though my mother typed (on the old manual typewriter) countless letters to companies to pitch the valve, nothing ever came of those efforts. A failure? Perhaps. But an example? Yes. Absolutely yes.

He acted like a person who had resources - although he didn’t. That got him into financial trouble with people and family members who because of those issues were lost to me growing up.

His models in his life, from what I can surmise, were not all that great. Yet despite all of that he provided me a solid foundation in which I could grow. His examples of work, pursuing his dreams and pure drive becoming part of what I would become.

My mother had died before him. We had moved to Virginia and I often feel moments of sadness that he faced being alone on his own as I can now so deeply understand. Having tasted of that well of sadness - I get a retroactive twinge for what he might have faced.

My parents drifted apart towards the end of their lives - it was always sad. Sad because of their story.

After her death, I remember him saying quite often that he reflected on her good points. How good she was. Some of that original love perhaps showing itself in his later life? His comments revealing a sensitivity I had never seen in him in that way before.

He looked at life in a quirky way - often I am reminded in my life at how I seem to have some of that perspective in how I see things. Not sure if that is genetic but the proclivity is certainly interesting.

At the end of his life, he did something that I am forever proud of him for accomplishing. He was alone in this - my being out of town was always something that haunted me. One of those side-effects of our moving to Virginia that I have had to make peace with over the years.

My parents, as I had mentioned, were both quite consistent drinkers. Something I had never embraced or felt compelled to do.

But towards the end of his life, as it is more clearly seen in retrospect, he checked himself into the VA Hospital in Buffalo. As it turned out, this was about a month and a half before he died of secondary issues of bladder cancer.

As I stand on the threshold of this new life that God has decided I will have, It is these lessons from my Father that I want to remember and make a part of every day I live going forward.

I know that the best of him is a part of me.

Just like my Father in heaven is going to ensure that the best of Him and His strength is in me each day of this new life He has ordained for me to live.

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