Memories Of Dad

I read the rules of Fathers’ Day and it didn’t say that your dad had to be alive for you to honor him so pull up a chair, have a couple of pieces of his favorite candy (orange slices) and let me tell you about the man that helped to make me who I am today and the lessons that he taught me. Then when I am done I want you to tell me about your dad and the lessons you learned from him.

Be kind. Dad paid it forward long before the movie came out. I remember when I was in the eighth grade and some friends of my sister had just gotten married. Wayne and Sandy stopped by my parents house before going off to college. They were broke. While they were getting in the car dad pulled Wayne off to the side and gave him forty dollars. That would be maybe five hundred dollars easily in today’s world. Money he didn’t really have or could afford but Wayne and Sandy needed the money more than he or we did. I remember him telling Wayne “You will be a success, when that day happens find someone less fortunate than you and give them forty dollars.”

Be fun. It wasn’t unusual for my dad and my Uncle Frank to dress up as the Bobsie Twins and attend a Halloween Party. When dad and friends Ed and Ted dressed up as women and joined the minister’s wife to form the Mongrel Sisters quartet for a church event they were a hit. While they were performing they overheard a six year-old boy tell his mom “Those are three of the ugliest women that I have ever seen” they laughed so hard they couldn’t finish their song.

Be playful. It wasn’t above dad to get down on his hands and knees in a store when Mom was shopping for a dress and crawl over to Mom where he couldn’t be seen and tickle her legs. Mom would wonder what is that feeling on her legs. There was nobody around. What just was happening? After a few tickles he would jump up and say “Hi, Honey!”. Mom would look down and laugh and mumble “Only, John!”

Be affectionate. It is OK for men to hug.

Surprises can be good. We always had big holiday celebrations. My aunt and uncle and their three kids weren’t really cousins and aunts and uncles they were another mom and dad and another set of siblings. So we always had twenty or more at our celebrations. We never spent a lot on gifts but because there was so many of us there were always a lot of gifts under the tree. The Christmas when I was seven after dinner they started handing out gifts, all the gifts disappeared and I didn’t get one gift. I was wondering what horrible thing that I did to not deserve a Christmas gift. Just then the doorbell rang and dad said “Bill, that is for you” I answered the door , looked through the softly falling snow, and tied to a tree in our front yard was a beautiful Shetland Pony. Dolly became my best and most faithful friend for years.

On Mothers’ Day I told you of the tough time when my life was in danger, my sister was having problems, and mom was recovering from cancer that Mom taught me a Mother’s love. Through that same time Dad taught me a Father’s love. While mom stayed by my bedside dad stayed home and ran the family hardware store. Well that is what he did during the day. At 6 PM he closed the store and drove the eighty miles to the hospital to spend an hour with mom and I, then drive the eighty miles back home. The next morning he would open the store at 8 AM, close the store and drive the eighty miles back the hospital. Six days a week he would make that one hundred and sixty mile round trip. Saturday nights he stayed at the hospital and Sundays he would spend the day with us. He never failed to tell mom and I he loved us nor failed to tell me to hang in there because he knew I was the toughest one in the family. I would have never recovered without his support.

There were many other lessons dad taught me. Sometimes doing the right thing means you will stand alone. That it often harder to be kind than be mean but always be kind. Even when he was dying he taught me faithfulness. He told me the last week that he was alive that in over sixty years of being married to mom that not only had he never cheated on her, he never even thought about it. I even learned a lesson from him after he died. Quality is better than quantity. A few years after he died mom and I were cleaning out a trunk and I found a love letter from dad to mom. In it he quoted someone “ a good lover isn’t one that romances several women, a good lover is one that romances one woman for a lifetime.” Dad lived that quote.

Dad wherever you are I need to stay two words to you that I should have said to you every day that you were alive. Thank you.

Now tell me about your dad and the lessons that he taught you.

PS

Dennis Day was yesterday’s answer. The question of the day starts again Monday.

The kindness meter, 35 people, 89 acts of kindness. Only 11 to go by midnight tonight!