Sunday, June 20, 2010

A Father

A world without fathers?

He came in at once, paused for a moment just inside the door, looked round, then soft on his moccasined feet strode quickly across the room, fell on his knees in front of the Director, and said in a clear voice: "My father!"
The word (for "father" was not so much obscene as -- with its connotation of something at one remove from loathsomeness and moral obliquity of child-bearing -- merely gross, a scatological rather than pornographic impropriety); the comically smutty word relieved what had become a quite intolerable tension. Laughter broke out, enormous, almost hysterical peal after peal, as though it would never stop. My father -- and it was the Director!
My father! Oh Ford, oh Ford! That was really too good. The whooping and roaring renewed themselves, faces seemed on the point of disintegration, tears were streaming. Six more test-tubes of spermatozoa were upset. My father!

Pale, wild-eyed, the Director glared about him in an agony of bewildered humiliation.

My father! The laughter, which had shown signs of dying away, broke out again more loudly than ever. He put his hands over his ears and rushed out of the room.

Aldous Huxley Brave New World
Much has been made lately of the consequences of poor fathering and absent fathering. The consequences are disastrous for the children and society at large. One could write for hours on this but why? I cannot say it any better than men such as Bill Cosby who has spoken out strongly against absent fathers. Mothers and Fathers make the world go round.

There seems to have been a recent study that showed that Lesbian couples were better parents that husband-wife pairs but that is nothing but carefully picked and spun propaganda that does not match reality as it only reflected the Personal Opinions of a few carefully picked Lesbian couples and was not at all scientific.

My father was not always right there. His job frequently had him on the road but he did that to meet our needs. His heart was here. When I was five he was overseas with the Marines and I remember many times just standing in front of his Marine portrait just wishing it would move but that was for his country and now I understand that.

He was a workaholic who never stopped. He was a service manager, electrical engineer, township supervisor, he was on the local fireboard and frequently worked with the county commissioners, whom he was on a first name basis with. I am not a workaholic like he was but I do try to be conscientious.




Sadly he is no longer able to care for himself or be the tough independent Father, Husband, Grandfather and American that he was for over seventy years but from time to time that man still comes out. Inside he is as tough as ever.

I love you Dad. Happy Fathers' Day.


Saturday, June 19, 2010

Well . . .

I acknowledge that I have been gone for too long. A year and a half ago I spent two to five hours a day on the net, now it seems like I can't spend that much time a month. I'm lucky to check my Email some days.

Why?

Mostly a house and yard. My younger brother who was here for about a year treated it as a flophouse while the young couple who tried to buy it were just out of their league, especially when their income dropped by ¾ when hubby went to prison for trying to kill her, then she just let the place disintegrate so a lot of my time is taken up with simple repairs, cleaning, yard work ( a biggy), garden (even bigger) and soon some painting. My Mom and Dad put a lot of themselves into this house and while I may be a redneck, I don't want the house looking like it belongs to white trash.

Work is going OK.

Mom and Dad are another story. Dad's mind is doing well but his body isn't. He is hanging in tough and I am surprised that he lived this long. Two years ago we were figuring on three to six months. His brother from North Carolina visited about a week ago and he told another aunt of mine that That guy might outlive all of us. and Dad is tough enough that he just might.

Mom is not in good physical shape but it gets worse; her mind is going. She is showing severe signs of dementia and paranoia. She has to go to a nursing home, no questions asked, and Dad will go with her just to be beside her. She is in a rehab center right now but her time there is just about up. She also believes that I and my brothers want to just lock her and Dad up and divvy up the estate, which is absolutely not true. Like I told my Dad years ago, I would rather inherit nothing and see you alive than see you die and get some money. I meant it and I certainly don't want to just lock my mother up.

Speaking of locking someone up, my number three brother (the same one who treated this as a flophouse) is going to spend a long time behind bars. He never got in trouble for a serious crime but it's just one act of stupidity after another and eventually misdemeanors pile up until the judge just says ENOUGH!.

Actually I am finding that there is a lot of pleasure and delight, which I had forgotten about, in simply gardening. Watching the plants sprout and grow and I have already sat and watched someone's face burn up as they ate an jalapeno that I had picked a couple of hours earlier. Dad was sitting at the table as well and almost giggling at her. (She was a friend of my brother Skip who thought she could eat one no problem.)