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Thinking about Father's Day, so I thought it would be fun to share memories about your dad!
My dad worked a lot when we were kids building his business. He got home late, worked in his home office and wasn't always available during the week. But on the weekend he always claimed a day with my sister and I. Typically, the most common "errands" with dad were either a trip to the computer store or the music store.
If we went to the computer store there was always a chance we could convince him to get us a game. Half the time it had to be an educational one.
But the most fun was going to Tower Records. Each store had a slightly different selection, so we might travel to a nearby town. On these trips, we'd get to pick the music for the car ride. And turn up the stereo. Usually the picks were limited to my dad's music, that we liked. But later we go to pick out our own stuff too. My favorite songs then were Grover Washington Jr tracks like "Just the two of us" and his cover of Bob Marley's "Jamming." Or "Street life" by the Crusaders. We'd spend hours at the music store at the listening stations or browsing!
The Tower store had a make your own tape machine, and once in a while you'd get to pick your songs and it would spit out a mix tape. I still have one of them floating around from when I was 8 or 9. It included Jackson 5, Bobby Brown and Jody Watley.
There are many good times I had with my dad but this is the first one that came to mind:
One breezy spring day when I was about seven he said, "Let's build a kite." (He was born in 1915 so it wasn't a matter of going to the store and buying a kite kit.)
He nailed together two lathes and then fashioned the kite body from newspaper. While he was doing that he had me tying rags together to form a tail.
Then he got a ball of cotton twine and wrapped it around a sturdy stick and fastened it to the kite bottom and we went out to sail it.
It was so much fun watching him run to get the kite launched and seeing it soar high into the sky. Finally I became impatient and wanted to do it myself. And it was quite a psychological tug of war to get him to turn the new toy over to me.
May, many years later this experience came back to me and gave me some insight into my father's nature. It was the first time I realized that he had a very lively and active little boy hiding under the surface of that responsible, mature exterior.
When I was around 13, my dad woke me up real early one summer morning. We drove out to the country to where this old windmill was. We set up our cameras and took pictures as the sun rose behind it. We then went and had breakfast and drove home. Did a lot of talking and had a lot of fun. He framed one of the photos I took, and it's hanging in their home 35 years later.
My dad is a mechanic but when my brother and I were young he delivered papers once a week. I remember going a few times with him when I didn't have school and getting up at 4 AM and helping deliver the papers along the route. It took a few hours and it was fun. Delivering papers he also knew of amazing parks all over the county and every few days we would go visit a new park and ride bikes, big wheels, or just run in the woods.
Getting to ride to the dump with him and choose the radio station on Saturdays.
Going to the gas station with him on Sundays to "fill up", always a chance he might get me gum
I remember him giving me pennies to throw into a water fountain when I was three, I always remember that moment so clearly.
My dad teaching me how to fish and clean/gut a fish in a cabin in Wisconsin. I felt pretty special as his daughter, for some reason it was always an activity the "boys" particiapted in while the girls lounged around.
My dad chasing off scary dogs from the neighborhood.
The big ceramic coffee mug of his he never cleaned.
Slipping into his office with him to discuss Tom Clancy novels. My mom had no interest in discussing books.
Coming to my school concerts and waving frantically from the crowd with a big goofy grin.
Telling me I looked nice, even in the height of my horrid, acne prone, greasy teenage hormonal phase.
Let me watch TV when my mom wasn't around.
Had nerves / patience of steel during my horrid back-talky moody teen years. Good god that man is a saint.
My father died from brain cancer in 1956 when I was 8 years old, so I don't have many clear specific memories of him. But I do know he was a kind & gentle man, and worked our small farm very hard to provide for his wife, my five older sisters, and me. Most of all, I remember that he loved us all very, very much. He, and my mother, raised us right, and taught us well.... and for that I'm eternally grateful.
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