BS: I Remember Father

Subject: BS: I Remember Father
From: GUEST,Azizi
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 11:47 AM

Happy Fathers' Day!

Let's give praises to fathers, and grandfathers, and other men who take on the role of father and make {made} a positive difference in their children's {and other children's}lifes!

Are there any memories you would like to share about your father, or grandfather, or other significant father figures?

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: GUEST,Wesley S
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 12:22 PM

Well - If it wasn't for my wife I wouldn't be a dad. So I bought her some roses yesterday. I believe in giving credit where credit is due.

My dad was a great guy. He worked in the aerospace program of the 60's. He taught me that doing a great job was a reward unto itself.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 12:30 PM

My ex has a triple-whammy today. We live in Texas where it's Juneteenth, it's his birthday, and it's father's day.

He and the kids are in Florida this week, visiting with his mother (their only remaining grandparent) and brother, so I called this morning and reminded folks of this occasion. His mom or brother may not make much of the day, but his kids do.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Janie
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 01:23 PM

Would that all children were blessed with a father such as mine.

Janie

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: CarolC
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 02:21 PM

And also Happy Father's day to stepfathers as well! (I'm married to one of the best.)

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Rapparee
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 03:02 PM

I wish I remembered more of my father...I was 5 when he died.

My wife's father, on the other hand, had a great Father's Day present: at 3:15 a.m. EDT today they took my mother-in-law to the hospital. She's out now and on medicine.

I myself am not aware of fathering any children, but my two brothers have and it averages 3 each for the 3 of us.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: sixtieschick
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 03:09 PM

Seven things about my father:

1. He was so outraged by the blatant racism in the Navy during WWW II when he was stationed on a South Sea island that he (white) forged papers and got himself transferred into the "colored" stevedore unit that got all the shittiest jobs.

2. He paid my mother's grad school tuition with winnings from a lottery ticket and a horse race, then supported her while she was in school with his Navy salary supplemented by crap game winnings.

3. He was fluent in Mandarin.

4. Long after he became president of an engineering firm, he continued to do volunteer plumbing and carpentry for his causes. He built a free medical clinic in his city.

5. He created ornamental metalwork. A poker palace commissioned a sculpture of a dragon from him, and it is now officially "public art" in the city where it lives.

6. One of his biggest regrets was that he didn't study classical ballet. He did, however, take tap dance lessons at age 60.

7. I miss him.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 03:18 PM

My dad was a working class, Joe. Sometimes he worked 10 and 12 hours at the mill. He never complained. He handed the paycheck to my mom. He wasn't a disciplinarian but he insisted that all of us were to come to the dinner table clean and bright. Dinner table conversation had to be polite or we were told to leave. Thats all he asked. Thats all he wanted.

I think about him alot. He didn't need much to be happy and when he laughed, tears rolled down his cheeks. I wish my kids knew him.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 04:15 PM

After my Mum died in their 60's, Dad seemed to change. he became less accessible.

I always loved him, but I was no good at expressing it. It seems sometimes so easy to express warmth to everybody else, but so difficult with someone you love.

I kept trying, but towards the end - he didn't remember the life we'd had together.

If you have the ability to let those around you know how much you love them - you are one lucky dude. Of course I miss him.....but I was somehow missing him by a mile when he was alive.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: LilyFestre
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 04:18 PM

My dad died when I was young too.

Two of my favorite memories of him are:

1. When I was about 4, he used to take me fishing at a private club. Nana would pack us a lunch of apples and peanut butter (my favorite) and he would take along a can of corn. He'd let me put the corn on the hook (I can still smell it today) and he'd fish while I'd be the "Lookout." He was NOT a member of the private fishing club!

2. Around the same time, my Dad would take me to the Pennsylvania Grand Canyon. We'd hike out in the woods and he would sit me on the very edge and take pictures. I thought it was great fun. My mother wanted to kill him.

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: *Laura*
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 04:40 PM

He always hugged me in a way no-one else ever did, or ever does now.

He smelt like... I don't know. But I miss it.

xLx

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: pixieofdoom
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 06:17 PM

I wish I could talk to my dad about all the things we never discussed......good and bad

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Charmion
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 09:23 PM

My Dad taught us the names of the trees and wild flowers, and the folk beliefs associated with them. Sage must be planted by a woman; plant a rowan tree by the door for good luck; elm wood is for coffins. He was full of stories, and every walk with him in town or country was a disquisition on our surroundings. Once we were past the driving-people-crazy stage of late childhood, I don't think I ever heard him utter a harsh word.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Amergin
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 10:01 PM

In a week...i get to meet my little girl...for the first time.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Deckman
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 10:21 PM

For my late Father: Thekney Hjalmer Frithien Niemi Knuttila Nelson ..."Mina Rakastaan Sinua!" Bob(Roope)Nelson

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Peter Kasin
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 10:24 PM

Amergin! That is one very special occasion coming up. A very happy father's day to you.

Sixtieschick say's it very succinctly and eloquently. Some of my memories: My father took me to my first Giants game. Willie Mays hit a homerun. He took me to my first pro boxing match; heavyweights Jerry Quarry vs Thad Spencer. He and mom took us to see the Broadway cast of West Side Story, on tour in San Francisco, and I fell completely head over heels for that musical. He took me to my first Chaplin and Keaton films, and exposed sixtieschick and I to so many interesting cultural events that became a part of our lives. Dad helped design an elementary school, did the HVAC engineering for many hospitals and other projects, and in the 1970's, invented a new type of kidney dialysis system that vastly improved its safety. Ironically, he had to be on dialysis himself
in his last year. He was a brave man, an independent thinker, and a good father.

Chanteyranger

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: CarolC
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 10:37 PM

Congratulatons Amergin! That's fantastic!

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Jeri
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 11:32 PM

My dad taught me to fish. The first time I fished with him, I caught a couple of large carp in the creek in back of our house. When I found out people didn't eat carp, I was upset I'd killed them. My dad told me about the old American Indian tradition of burying a fish under a tree you'd just planted. The fish would fertilize the tree and the tree would grow better because of the fish. I think that, aside from the fact fish make good fertilizer, the story was a complete fabrication. I felt better though.

One thing I'd forgotten about until I saw the Baltimore Oriole a few days ago, is perhaps an exquisite example of what big, strong daddies do for their little girls. From our back porch, we had a perfect view of a nest suspended from a very tall tree in the back yard. Orioles hang their nests like hammocks. The orioles built the nest one year, and seemed to just patch it up and re-use it. One spring, before egg-laying, the nest came loose from the tree. I cried because the poor birdies didn't have a house anymore. My father got a really tall ladder and some wire, and wired the nest back up to the limb. Neither my mom or my dad believed the orioles would actually move back into this human-molested nest, but they did, and came back for several more years until the whole tree came down.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Jun 05 - 11:51 PM

My first Father's Day without my dad. It didn't really hit me until this evening. I almost took his fiddle out, which I just got a couple of weeks ago, but it just seems too soon..my heart isn't ready to *speak* with him that way. Soon, though, I shall start working on his oral history book, again, and then...

love you, dadddy,

"katty"

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Jeanie
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 03:07 AM

I know exactly what you mean about the fiddle, kat. I have my dad's piano accordion, and it sat in its case for quite a while. My mum had given me some of his old clothes (and I mean OLD, too bad for the charity shop), to throw away, including his oldest and tattiest tweed hat. I just couldn't throw it away, it was so much "him", so the hat lives in the accordion case. When the time feels right, you will take your dad's fiddle out of its case and I know you will have such joy. I remember my dad every time I play, sing and generally lark about dancing and laughing with my daughter (which, thankfully, happens a lot in our house) the way he did with me, and I hear him in a lot of the things I say.

He's been especially in my thoughts since my mum died 3 weeks ago. After he died, my attention was inevitably directed to my mother and she was my main concern and responsibility. Now, in mourning and remembering her, I feel I can properly and fully mourn and remember him, too.

After he died, a friend of mine said: "I really liked your dad. Wherever he was, he always enjoyed himself and was genuinely interested in everyone and everything." Whenever his name comes up in conversation with family or friends, everyone smiles. What better epitaph could anyone have ?

- jeanie (who can imagine her dad reading this and saying "Well, that's all jolly splendid")

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 03:13 AM

Wish I had a story like that. My 'dad' was a useless drunk. My grandfather took his place and it's him I think of at this time of year.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Peter Kasin
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 03:48 AM

Jeri, the Baltimore Orioles are known for laying an egg :-).

Chanteyranger (taking cover)

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Peace
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 04:29 AM

In Canada, Father's Day is always celebrated the third Sunday in June.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Skipjack K8
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 08:55 AM

The old man organised his departure from this life just under three years ago, and periodically I miss him intensely, the rest of the time just getting on with stuff.

My first thought when I read the masthead message took me back to when I was about thirteen, in the early 70s, and I dragged my admittedly Victorian father in front of the telly to witness Status Quo's three axemen giving it some. He said it was interesting, and did I realise what they were doing?

"Playing their guitars, Dad."

"No, son, they're masturbating."

It took a few more years for me to realise he was right.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: ranger1
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 09:40 AM

I'm blest with both a dad and a step-dad that I love dearly and get along with.

My dad always chartered a plane to take my older brother and I for a plane ride on our birthdays when we were really young. It was a huge treat and I probably have that to thank for the fact that I have no fear of flying.

My step-dad is a wonderful man who married a woman with two kids that he always treated as if they were his own, right from the start. Even though he and my mom are now divorced, when people ask him if he has any kids, he always answers: "yes, two daughters."

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: catspaw49
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 11:00 AM

From an earlier Father's Day thread, but worth posting again......

My Dad was an engineman on the Pennsylvania Railroad for the whole of his adult working life. He started out of high school on the section gang and went into engine service a couple of years later. He was in a Railway Batallion during WWII and came back to the Pennsy as soon as it was over. The PRR was early in converting to Diesels but Dad fired the last of the steamers. Advancement on the roads was based on seniority and although he had qualified as an engineer he stayed as a fireman for many years until he could hold a regular slot on the board. So when the last of M1's and K4's made their final runs on the PanHandle Division, Dad fired those engines. I remember years later in about 1962 when the last of the steamers were cut up for scrap in the Columbus Yards, it was about as close as I ever came to seeing him cry at that point in my life. He was an engineer for the rest of his life and even with the Diesels, an engineer still had a reputation of some sort and the Ol' Man was known as a "smooth rider"....a term used by those in the caboose to describe a good engineer who could stop and start, take in or run out slack as needed, without disturbing their rest or their pinochle game.

Railroaders back then were still a special breed who loved what they did. 30 years later, one of the most poignant memories I have of my Dad is from a time when he was quite ill within only a few weeks of his death. He had me take him to the Yards so he could pick up some things out of his locker. We cleaned it out and packed up his "Grip" for the final time. But on the way out we sort of had to "detour" through an engine shop and though I protested, he went that way. Walking through the shops, we stopped at an idling GP9 and he slowly started to climb to the cab. Again, I protested that this was way too much effort that he shouldn't be wasting, but he looked down at me and said, "Just one last time." So we climbed up and sat in the cab for awhile as his hands touched the throttle, air brakes,dynamic brake, and all of those things that had been his world for so many years..........and if I was ever closer to him, I don't know when it would have been.

The rails were close at hand for people to see and hear and feel and they grew with us. For those who long for older and simpler times, the sound, feel, and the smell of a great steamer are all that is needed to trigger visions of a different life in a different world, far removed from this current time and place. And today as on many other days, I miss my Dad......W.J. "Unk" Patterson, Engineman, Pennsylvania Railroad. I'm sorry too he never knew my kids and sorrier still that they will never know him.


Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: Sorcha
Date: 20 Jun 05 - 04:54 PM

Loads about my dad....mostly camping ones. How do you want your eggs?
I don't care.
Crack, plop. Don't tell me you don't care.

Where shall I dump the dishwater?
There's 40 million acres out there...
(dump)
NOT on my god damn feet!!

My grand dad was an old time Switchman and telegrapher for the Santa Fe Railroad...he changed the tracks with levers from a signal tower and was in charge of all the dit dit dit da communications. He used to let me go to work with him, and try to switch the tracks. I could hang from the levers and not move them.

Subject: RE: BS: I Remember Father
From: dianavan
Date: 21 Jun 05 - 01:12 AM

ranger1 - Thanks for mentioning step-dads. They deserve so much credit. They chose the role and it wasn't easy. My kids were raised by a step-dad and they adore him. Father is one thing but step-dad was always there for them. He read the bedtime story and provided all the extras in their lives. Best of all, he was their friend and confident.

So happy Fathers Day all you unsung heroes! We will be forever grateful. You did it and you didn't even have to.