15 years, and it still seems like just yesterday
This is my 15th Father’s Day without my father, and each one brings new opportunities for introspection. Fifteen years of cataloging memories.
When my dad died after a swift decline from dementia, I worried the sad memories would overshadow the ones I wanted to keep. In fact, the opposite has been true. Time has sharpened the good memories, and I’m grateful for that.
My dad fried the bacon in our house. He was very patient with it, and the wait was torture. I fry bacon now using his “low and slow” method, and when I’m tempted to toss it all in the skillet to save time, I hold back.
My dad taught me how to tie a necktie. A tie was part of the Brownie uniform in the ’60s, and we stood at the mirror together — my dad behind me with his arms around me — tying my little orange
tie around my neck.
I never saw my dad wear shorts or go barefoot. He wore a longsleeved shirt to my wedding, but I think that’s the only time I saw him in long sleeves.
When we moved to our new house, he built long shelves for my stuffed animals and painted my room the color “Crocus.” I picked the paint color, and I didn’t even know what a crocus was, but it was purple, and I liked it. He forbade me to stick thumbtacks in the newly painted wall, and I was despondent since I had dozens of pictures of David Cassidy to display. He didn’t back down, but he did make me a giant bulletin board that was probably seven feet long.
He drank Pearl beer and liked sardines. Do you know anyone who eats sardines out of a little tin container? My dad did.
He was “The Pecan Whisperer.” He could coax a harvest out of his beloved pecan trees in any year. Squirrels were his sworn enemies.
My dad was the office manager of a contracting company, and sometimes he brought “homework” to do at the kitchen table. He would let me collate and staple things; I thought it was the greatest job in the world. Later, he patiently tutored me in math at the same table, which was considerably less fun.
Once, my dad took me out to dinner, just the two of us. I was maybe 12 or so, and I had to get dressed up. We went to an Italian restaurant on the Gulf Freeway, which was probably not particularly good or even all that fancy. I ate lasagna, and it came in one of those crockery dishes that comes to the table straight from the oven. It was so exotic to me.
My dad took me to Astros games and tried not to roll his eyes when I put a Greg Gross poster in my closet.
My dad and I were the late church-goers in our family (probably because the bacon took so long to cook). There was a radio show on the AM country station in his trusty, red, Ford pickup. It seemed like every Sunday, we heard Don Williams and Emmylou Harris singing “If I Needed You.” We loved that song. We danced to it at my wedding. I whispered it in his ear on the last night of his life:
If I needed you, would you come to me?
Would you come to me for to ease my pain?
If you needed me, I would come to you.
I would swim the seas for to ease your pain.
My dad used Aqua Velva Ice Blue aftershave and Sir Walter Raleigh pipe tobacco, so he always smelled like a combination of the two. On weekends, he smelled like our garage — part lawnmower gas, part grass clippings, part sawdust and paint.
I had a root canal when I was away at college. My dad sent me a World’s Finest Chocolate bar in an envelope with a note written on the label: “Maybe this will help your aching tooth.” The chocolate is long gone, but I still have the wrapper.
Once, when I lived in Missouri, I called my dad in Houston because I heard a noise outside my house. It never occurred to me to call 911.
He bought me a toolbox and stocked it with things I’d need, including a note: “Never mess with anything electric. Love, Dad.” Every time I open the toolbox, I see his handwritten advice.
I don’t mess with anything electric, and if I leave a light on or the closet door open, I can feel him scowling at me. But other times, when I’m measuring twice or shooing squirrels off my deck, I know I’m making him proud.
But still. Fifteen years. It’s an eternity. It’s the blink of an eye.
If I needed you, would you come to me? Would you come to me for to ease my pain? If you needed me, I would come to you. I would swim the seas for to ease your pain.
from “If I Needed You” sung by Don Williams and Emmylou Harris