Today is my father's birthday. Fathers often get taken for granted. Well, I don't know so much if that is what it amounts to or expressing to a father how you feel is not usually as easy and comfortable as the same conversation and admissions with a mother. There are all sorts of built-in barriers to a lot of that sort of emoting to Dear Old Dad. My father spent his entire career with the telephone company (when there was only one, in the United States) and told me with a smirk on his face that Christmas Day and Mother's Day vied for the highest single day of telephone call volume each year. Then he let the other shoe fall and told me that Father's Day held the record each year for highest number of collect calls in a single day. "Hi Dad, Happy Father's Day and thanks for picking up the tab!"
I've never done that but my father has certainly had to pay for being my father in many costly and painful ways over the years. He has never held that against me. I have probably dangled my own feet over the fire much more than he. I am so proud of my father. He's by no means perfect but I wouldn't change anything about him. Warts and all - I love to point out to people that, "That's MY Dad." As I shared in my post on my Mom's birthday, I have parents whom I am proud to share and lend out to my friends. Not everyone (and it seems way too few people have) has as healthy a relationship with their parents as I have with mine. There's plenty of room in my parent's hearts and home for anyone that needs them.
I learned at a very young age that my parents and particularly my father garnered respect that was never sought or demanded. I even had to contend with some of the kids I knew that wanted to nudge me out of the way and be my Dad's "favorite." That is really and truly funny because my dad is a man of few words, even less tolerance for nonsense, and does not like social gatherings. He basically lives in the downstairs family room of his home and I don't think he'd come out unless a fire flushed him from his "Man Cave," as my mother refers to it. The sounds of flipping television channels and the rustling of snack wrappers are the only audible signs of life. There is nothing more comical than when my mother invades his sanctuary to snag chips or soft drinks and bring them upstairs to give to members of the family or guests. She is a towering figure of 5'-2" tall and about 112 pounds. My father is 6'-4" and in the 200's. It's like watching a Chihuahua yap at a Great Dane - hands on her hips in defiance and neck bent all the way back on her shoulders to make eye contact with him. She, like all of my friends, think nothing of invading his personal space or gravitating toward him wherever he is. He just attracts people. They want to be with him. They want to impress him, and, they want his approval. That's just not something he has ever been comfortable doing. But, he does it anyway. My Dad may be uncomfortable in social settings but he fears only two things: God (as in reverence and respect) and failing to act responsibly. In other words, my father has nothing to fear. He is the most honor-bound, duty-bound, responsible person I have ever known.
My mother sometimes feels slighted that he can not express his love and devotion but I remind her that he demonstrates those, without fail, every moment of their lives. He never experienced that in his own family. He is the equivalent of emotionally color blind. He just doesn't get the nuances and subtle variations of emotional interaction. I remind my mother, as well, "That's what he's got you for." His own upbringing never made any space for expressions of love and caring. I experienced it as a grandchild and can only imagine how much colder it was as a son. But, he knows how to show love by his actions not by his words. He may lean too heavily toward practical gifts like washing machines and vacuum cleaners but my mother has never had to fuel her own car, deal with any maintenance, ask for a dollar, doubt his fidelity, or worry when or if he were coming home. Just the other day I told her that his calling her every day at lunch, from his office, made me want to do the same thing when I grew up and had a wife. "That showed how much he loved you and was really important to me, as a boy," I told her. Her response caught me totally off guard. "Yeah, I used to think that, too, when he first began calling - then I realized he was only making small talk until I told him what had come in the mail that day!" I am still laughing uncontrollably because *THAT* makes sense! My sister is three years younger than I and has that gift all daughters possess in relation to their fathers - they can melt a man to a sappy puddle of goo. He had a little more trouble being the strict disciplinarian with her. He had no such reservations with me - and no recourse, to be honest. But one evening while getting ready for bed my sister started crying that "Daddy doesn't love us . . . He never tells us . . . He never hugs us . . ." and my Mom, interrupted with the most important words that I, as his son, needed to hear. "Your father never does anything for himself. He only thinks of us, first. When we have a meal, your father waits until we have all taken everything we want and have had our pick and then he takes what is left. Your father won't even go buy himself underwear if he isn't sure you and your brother and I have need of anything, first. Other fathers go to bars and drink their paychecks and don't care about their families. Your father loves you and he might not say it out loud all of the time but we are his whole life. Take a good look at your father and see what a man looks like." Preach it, Mom!
My Dad had been a Marine and missed being selected Honor Guard at the White House because he was 1/2 " too short. He was an expert marksman and possessed all of the necessary skills and attitude to dispatch any deserving target. The alterations to his psyche by the Corp were so ingrained that when I was in my late teens and came home very late from a night out he had stayed up to meet me. He looked very uncomfortable which was not normal. It seems that he had watched a movie called, "The Great Santini," which is the relationship between a Marine sergeant and his son. My father apologized to me. He said he saw things in that movie that were too close to home and that he was afraid he had harmed me. I am the one that needs to apologize to him. I have never become as much a man as my father. He never pressured me to make me think that way. I just so want to not be a disappointment and a worry to that man. My father has a brilliant and reasonable mind. He is gifted artistically and mathematically. He was a successful engineer. My father was actually offered a full scholarship to the U.S. Naval Academy but my unexpected conception sort of spoiled that. Neither of my parents ever blamed me and my father claims that I saved his life because the graduating class he would have been in all died in Vietnam. So, as a child when I was trying to learn to write, my father sat down with me and I watched him teach himself to write with his left hand (because I am left-handed) so that he could instruct me. At that early age that told me everything I needed to know about my father. He never tried to change me only make every opportunity for me to be the best me that I could be.
So let me tell you the other things you need to know about my Dad. My mother's brother was a Green Beret and is about eight years younger than my father. They have been buddies forever. My uncle would come home from a training mission and my civilian father and he would test each other. My uncle would come in and say, "Hey old man let me show you what I learned." And my father would say, "Bring it on, Junior." The next thing would be a bunch of out of breath laughter and my father would have my uncle pinned to the ceiling. They were like kids. Then leap forward about a dozen years to a near fatal accident for that same uncle. My father could not deal with that at all and hates hospitals as I came to discover. Only because it was my uncle could he muster the resolve to go to that hospital room. I have never seen my father so shaken but at the birth of all of his grandchildren he was just as much a mess. He has nine. None of them is fooled by the big, pretending to be fierce, man. They've got his number and he's everybody's giant teddy bear.
He doesn't speak much and he tries to stay sequestered in his "Man Cave" but he's always listening and ready to spring into action. I learned that the hard way at about 14 years old. My mother was telling me to do something and I mouthed off. Before the words were out of my mouth, he was up those stairs and I was having a lesson on respect and the proper attitude toward authority and women "administered" by the big guy. That same man also took me aside when I was an awkward adolescent and a distant female relative had just spent ten minutes going on and on about how my curly hair and eyelashes would make me such a pretty girl. He punctuated that conversation with the word, "Son." That was the first and only time in my memory that he ever called me that directly. As I mentioned, earlier, he had no personal experience from his upbringing to know of love being expressed or many of the other things that he taught and willed himself to do and be for his own family. Just as an indication of his side of the family we only referred to his parents formally as "Grandmother and Grandfather;" no pet names like my mom's family. By pure accident I picked up another phone while he was speaking to his parents after we had moved to another state. My father was 35 years old at that time. In wrapping up the conversation with his parents I heard him struggle and finally blurt out the words, "I Love You." There was silence on the other end of the line! Never did I ever hear his parents tell them they loved him.
Well I Love You, Dad. I want everyone to hear it.
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