Fathers Day: Happy Fathers Day, Dad

[Stinky The Clown]

The memories have aged well. They're no longer the sharp pain of immediate loss. The inevitable bad memories have amazingly gone so far to the back of my mind as to be nonexistent, while the best memories have become even warmer as they've softened and grown fuzzy with the passage of time.

Happy Fathers Day, Dad.

All these years you've been gone and yet I still miss you. Maybe even more than ever. Your grandkids are grown now. They remember you too, but not as much as they might have had you still been here. But you'd be proud of them. They've become fine adults. You made me who I am and I have done little but pass that on to them.

My dad was just an anonymous man. He worked in a factory. He went on strike with his union. I remember being four ... or was it five? ... and walking that picket line with him, not understanding, but proud to hold a sign just like his. Just like yours, Dad. See me? I learned a new word, too. 'Scab'.

My dad met Mom when he was drafted and stationed in her hometown, guarding a factory making materials for the war. My grampa went to the Army encampment every Sunday. He would ask the sergeant if there were 'two Italians boys' he could take home for Sunday dinner. He'd have them back by curfew, he promised. My Dad was one of them.

Five years later he came back from North Africa and Italy and France and then Germany. He served under Patton for a while. He always spoke well of *that* George and he was proud of the picture he had of Monty in his jeep - the jeep with my Mom's name painted on its sides - when, for a day, he drove Monty around.

But, except for a very few stories - all happy or humorous - he never spoke about the war. It just was.

Dad was so ordinary its painful. Like an ordinary Dad, he helped out when I was a Cub Scout and Mom was a den mother. I have a pin the scouts gave him, thanking him for twenty years of service. Like any ordinary dad would, he and a few other Dads banded together and founded a Little League for our neighborhood. I remember having such fun when, literally with picks and shovels and hammers and saws, I hung out with him while they built a field and bleachers, a concession stand and press box for that LIttle League they founded. I have the news clippings and the nice plaque he got for that. Another twenty year thing.

Dad's youth was spent in the Depression. Like Mom, he was a 'clean your plate' preacher to my brother and me. And he never replaced what he could fix. Never. I have his tools out in the garage. I still use them. At least the ones that I didn't give to my sons. Those tools .... twenty years times 3. And going strong. Yeah, Dad. I'll fix it.

Mom kept a secret from my brother and me. We knew Dad never finished high school. What we didn't know was that well into our teen years, he decided to get a GED. Just because. And then he went on a journey of self education. His job required math. A promotion required more. I now know why Dad was reading my college trig textbook. He got the promotion.

I still miss you, Dad. A lot. You're still my best friend.

Happy Fathers Day ..... to my dad .... and to all of yours.

[stellanoir]

1. what a lovely

heartfelt tribute.

[BOSSHOG]

2. Thanks Hubs

This will be my third Father's Day without my Dad but he's still close.

[Stinky The Clown]

8. Boss, it gets better each year ....

.... it never goes away, but the sadness becomes a sort of sweet ache. And then mourning becomes celebration. I'm not sure this could ever be the case with a child or a spouse, but with your parents ..... its kinda like we're wired to do that. The same as we *know* we're ready to see our kids leave home when its time.

Happy Fathers Day to your Dad, too, my friend.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

3. Kicked and recommended..... what a warm and respecting tribute

to your father.... thanks for posting this.... 4

[Breeze54]

4. What warm memories you have of your Dad...Beautiful!

My father passed away a few years back and I miss him and think of him almost daily.
He was a 'depression era' young man too and he fixed everything!
You brought back a lot memories for me. Thanks for posting this. ;)

:loveya:

"It doesn't matter who my father was; it matters who I remember he was."
~~By Anne Sexton (1928-1974) U.S. poet.~~


"The most important thing a father can do for his children is to love their mother."
~~Author Unknown


"To her the name of father was another name for love."
~~By Fanny Fern.~~

[stevedeshazer]

5. Happy Father's Day

I lost Dad just over three years ago.

It's days like these when I really miss him.

K&R

[IronLionZion]

6. Is Father's Day today or tomorrow?

I feel like such a dork for not knowing. Oh I'll probably just call my Dad today to be safe.

[Breeze54]

7. Father's Day falls on the 3rd Sunday in June!

http://www.holidays.net/father/story.htm

Mrs. John B. Dodd, of Washington, first proposed the idea of a "father's day" in 1909.
Mrs. Dodd wanted a special day to honor her father, William Smart.
William Smart, a Civil War veteran, was widowed when his wife (Mrs. Dodd's mother) died
in childbirth with their sixth child. Mr. Smart was left to raise the newborn and his
other five children by himself on a rural farm in eastern Washington state.
It was after Mrs. Dodd became an adult that she realized the strength and selflessness
her father had shown in raising his children as a single parent.

The first Father's Day was observed on June 19, 1910 in Spokane Washington.
At about the same time in various towns and cities across American other people
were beginning to celebrate a "father's day."
In 1924 President Calvin Coolidge supported the idea of a national Father's Day.
Finally in 1966 President Lyndon Johnson signed a presidential proclamation
declaring the 3rd Sunday of June as Father's Day.


Father's Day has become a day to not only honor your father, but all men who act as a father figure.
Stepfathers, uncles, grandfathers, and adult male friends are all honored on Father's Day.

[JeffR]

9. Thank you H2S, thank you.

This expresses far better than I could how I feel about my dad, 39 years after his death.

[Stinky The Clown]

10. You're welcome .... look at post 4 by Breeze .......

.... wonderful quotes.

[democrank]

11. Such a meaningful Father`s Day tribute. Thanks.

Brought tears to my eyes. I loved this...."never replaced what he could fix. Never." Sounds like your Dad was the salt-of-the-earth type, reliable, principled, solid. I love to hear stories about Dads like that. I`m glad that you have these wonderful memories to cherish.

[Stinky The Clown]

12. Many years ago, they bought a house that had an above ground pool

The sides were made of interlocking slats of a pretty heavy galvanized steel, and were about four feet long and eight inches wide. They didn't want to keep the pool, so they dismantled it. My mom was one not to keep anything that might be excess. My dad was .... well ... pretty much a pack rat. They balanced each other well. He agreed to throw away the (gee ... maybe I can use this) pool liner, but he drew the line at those slats.

They became stools for use on the patio (cement slab in their yard). Some became end tables for use with the stools. They became shelves in the basement and garage. They became a step ladder for mom when she got too old to use a flimsier folding ladder. They became a work bench, which now resides in my garage and sees use as a welding table.

Yup .... fix it and use it, and then adapt and and reuse it.

I won't mention the beautifully crafted machinst's tool box, with the many tiny drawers, he crafted from the wood veneer cabinet of their first teevee set.

[democrank]

13. A machinist`s tool box from an old tee vee? Priceless.

Came back to read your beautiful tribute again and I`m so glad I did because I got to read more about this "pack rat." Bless him for his resourcefulness, a trait I truly value.

[kineneb]

14. thanks, and to my grandfather

who, if he were alive would be 108 (he died at 87)- Happy Fathers Day and thank you for being who you were. I still miss you.

As a young man, he went off to Canada to enlist in WWI, because he was a year too young for the American Army. My grandparents survived the Depression like your family, reusing everything they could. Papa was a minor pack rat, but his collection was mostly tools and stuff that he "might use sometime". I still have some of the tools and when I use them, sometimes I think he is looking over my shoulder approvingly.

After raising my mom, they took me in, as a small child, when my parents divorced in the early 1960s. He taught me how to use the shop tools even though I was a girl (which was pretty enlightened). I then worked for 20 years for an musical instrument builder, using those skills.

[Stinky The Clown]

15. Looking over your shoulder .....

Sparkly knew my mom, but never my dad. That said, and as I often tell her, he would have loved her. My mom told her that too.

Some years ago, we were painting a few rooms in our house. Sparkly was doing something with a ladder and a paint can and a brush that could easily have led to a minor catastrophe involving said paint, brush and ladder. I was elsewhere at the moment. She felt my father's presence and imagined him laughing lovingly and saying to her "Go get him to help you." (meaning me).

Sparkly doesn't like me to tell this story because she fears someone will think she's nuts. I told her then and believe it today. What she imagined is *exactly* what my dad would have said and done. And she had no real way to know that.

When you imagine your Papa at your shoulder, believe it. He's there, in one way or another. Either as a gentle ghost (if you believe in the afterlife) or as a warm and comforting memory from your childhood (if you don't). In either case, the sensation is, indeed, reality.

Your Papa gave you a gift. And it continues to give. Its called love.

[Yogi]

16. Happy Fathers Day

Thanks.

[Totally Committed]

17. To my son and sons-in-law, and to all the fathers here at DU:

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

TC