WebKittyn Warbles
Monday, June 01, 2009
Heroes - Post One. My Dad.
Well this didn't take a whole lot of thought.
Even if he hadn't died in January my dad would still be my hero but this is just one more thing I can do in honour of him. He's been my hero for as long as I can remember and it wasn't just because I was a daddy's girl my whole life.
My dad had it rough. His own father died in WWII when he was very small and his mother was a Finnish speaking immigrant who decided, after months of physical abuse, that she no longer wanted to care for a son as a widow. She dumped her Finnish speaking son on her dead husband's sisters and mother and never looked back ever. That was the last contact he had with his mother and while he was young, he was old enough to know his mother abandoned him (he was around 10).
He grew up poor but loved in an Irish-Catholic family that nurtured the hell out of him. He was given a love of education and family and while they may not have had much, they had love and they had each other. He grew, he went to school, he worked, he became a solid young man.
He served his country as a member of the US Air Force, those were some of the best times he ever had. He was stationed in Alaska for a while and he had so many awesome stories of life in Alaska, life in the Air Force in the 50's and the many times they would get in trouble. When he came out he went to college, got his degree and moved on to graduate work.
While in school he met, courted and married my mother. Theirs was a whirlwind romance culminating in my drunken father chasing my mother's car with his Good Humour truck all through Mt. Vernon until she gave him a shot. She was a spoiled Jewish rich girl who was totally out of his league but he won her over and they were married on New Year's Eve.
His passion had always been reading, he was a man who would read any and every book he got his hands on. Somewhere along the way he made a decision to buck the system and follow his dream. He walked away from teaching and entered the world of rare book dealing. He would spend every free minute trolling library sales, estate sales, tag sales and eventually he built up a stock large enough to open a store.
I came along during all of this and I could not have asked for a better father. He taught me the wonder of reading at an early age and would pack us all into the car during the Summer to drive across the country so I could experience everything the US had to offer. He sent me to private school and Summer camp from his book business and maintained a home with a pool and all the amenities.
He loved my mother in a way you don't see very often anymore. They were together 47 years and were as in love at the end as they were on day one. He was my mother's first and only lover and if there is such a thing as a 'soul mate,' he was hers.
He had a warped and perverse sense of humour which he also passed along to me. When I was 5 and curious about the basement (where I didn't belong), he told me not to go down there because the washing machine was actually a monster that ate children. He loved to scare me and I loved it when he did it. He never let things get boring, on the weekends there were always trips to the zoo, aquarium, botanical gardens, museums, fairs, anything and everything.
He pushed me, he challenged me, he made me work hard at everything I did.
When I was 14, my dad officially became my hero in a true superhero sense. I had been molested earlier that Summer by a freak of nature employed by the camp I went to. I wasn't raped but stuff went on and a 34 year old man isn't supposed to restrain a 14 year old until she jerks him off. There was a camp reunion I insisted on going to and the pervert actually had the nerve to show up. My father flew into a rage like I had never seen before and went after this guy like a raging bull. I think he would have killed him if security for the place hadn't broken it up. My eyes shined for my daddy in a whole new light that night. That night he was my daddy, Superman, Batman and all the others wrapped into one rare book dealer.
As we both aged, he remained my best friend and the one person I could tell everything to. He didn't always understand what I was going on about but he listened and he laughed and he was always there for me. When I moved out I would call him every day for at least an hour and we would just talk or watch golf together over the phone.
I lost my dad in January after a year-long bout with multiple issues that almost killed him a few times. He went peacefully in his sleep, here at the house with a smile on his face. I'm still not doing very well but I try.
There are no heroes for me any more heroic than my dad so I wanted to start June's NaBloPoMo off with the right note. Every little girl should have a dad who is her best friend, her dad and her hero. I was definitely one of the lucky ones.
I love you, Dad.
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I’m sitting here in tears after reading your “super” post. Thank you for sharing such a personally insightful post. I envy you the love and joy you experienced with your father. Blessings and love wrapped up in a reader’s mind are nothing to sneeze at or disregard. Thank you.
Mare Martell Stotler on 06/03 at 09:33 PM -
I think the only thing he seems to be missing is the cape.
on 06/05 at 08:41 PM
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