Fatherless

I knew something was different that first November when my birthday rolled around and there was no card in the mail addressed “To my one and only daughter, xxoo, Daddy.” Then there was Thanksgiving which marked my first attempt to cook a turkey, the one he was not there to carve. And that first Christmas when I had one less gift to buy. But I don’t think it really hit me full force until the following June, that first Father’s Day when it seemed like everyone in the world but me had someone to buy a silly tie for. Up until then it felt like he was away on a trip and any moment I would hear his voice on the phone, “Hi honey. It’s me. I think your mom’s mad at me. Any idea what I did?”

I was fatherless.

It hit me like that big wave that crashes over your head just when you thought the ocean was calm. The one that throws you forward and leaves you gasping for air. Except I wasn’t on the beach with my toes sinking in the sand. I was in the card store surrounded by people who weren’t like me. People that had a father to tell funny stories you had heard a hundred times before but still made you laugh. A father whose big bear hugs made you certain that everything, no matter what, would be okay.

Up until then I had a brave face in public. I had been riding on a wave of numbness since that September day I got “the call.” The one that had me driving that familiar stretch of i-95 knowing what was on the other end, even though no one had told me he hadn’t made it.

He had died too soon. 64. An age that seems even younger now than it did then. And he had left me fatherless. To stand in that dreaded card store on that June day, surrounded by rows and rows of sentiments from jokes to proclamations of “Best Dad in the World!” feeling more alone than I ever had before.  For the first time in my adult life I didn’t have my Daddy to buy a card for.

That was when I felt it from the tears welling in my throat to the weakness in my knees. He really was gone. This was not a bad dream I was going to wake up from. I was going to celebrate Father’s Day 1987 and every Father’s Day forward with just his memory.

I kept my Ray Bans securely over my eyes and got out of that store as fast as I could.  The wound I felt was not like one of those boo boos he put a band-aid on when I was a kid, kissed it to God and promised me would be gone by the time I got married. This was the kind that time would heal, but would always leave me with a scar. The one I still feel almost 26 years later. The one that continues to have me avoiding card stores in June and hitting delete on every message that includes Father’s Day gift suggestions.

Some might call that denial. I call is survival.

I prefer to use this day to think of the joy my father brought into my life and the lives of everyone who knew him, than the pain of his loss. I like to think of his silly jokes, how he loved to dance, and that he was one of the few people I have ever met who could make any kind of real progress with the Sunday Times Crosswood Puzzle. I like to remember him as the man my mother fell in love with on a boat trip around Manhattan.

If I close my eyes today and remember the wonderful memories he left as his legacy I really will feel the warmth of one his giant hugs. The kind that still make me believe it is all going to be all right. No matter what. And I remember what it took me years to understand. I am really not fatherless. I never have been. Spirit lives on long after our physical selves leave this earth. And his spirit was so strong I can call it in whenever I sit still long enough and ask . Which is what I will be doing this Father's Day, as I avoid those card stores!

One of my personal favorites!

My brother posted this on FB. I think it captures the essence of who Dad was!

Detox Tech Diet Day 6. What Would Dad Say ?

I've been wondering what my father would have to say about all this technology. When Dad left this world it was 1986. A lot had changed since he was born in 1921, but in retrospect the change was just the tip of the iceberg.

In 1986 a cellular phone in an automobile was a relatively new concept. Handheld phones were rare and big enough to double as a doorstop. And if you don't believe me check out the one Michael Douglas is using  in the movie Wall Street.  There was no Internet information highway, no iPods, cable television was considered a luxury and CNN was only six years old.

So today, on Father's Day, also Day 6 of my Detox Tech Diet, I am wondering what he would have to say about this plugged into something 24/7 world we live in.

Dad was a fan of new technology. He got into the appliance business in the early days of refrigeration. He worked for companies like Crosley, Westinghouse, and Philco-Ford. My mother tells me that when they were first married in 1951 they had no money and very little furniture, but they had a black and white Crosley television that sat on a cardboard box  they turned on to watch a funny new show called I Love Lucy.

Dad worked  surrounded by what was considered cutting edge at that time and so we grew up with an abundance of the latest new technology, like the dishwasher on wheels that barely fit next to the counter and had to be attached with a hose to the kitchen faucet.

Dad was fascinated by progress. And I imagine he would  be sitting wide eyed and  with a great big smile in front of the computer my mother  refuses to own if he were still here. He would have enjoyed keeping up with every member of our big fat Greek family through pictures on Facebook. I think he would have embraced cable and I imagine be  a fan of the History Channel.  I don't believe he would ever forgo the newspaper, if for nothing else the crossword puzzle. Dad is one of the few people I have ever known that  could complete the entire Sunday puzzle and in ink.

But Dad was also a socializer. He liked people. I think he too would worry about communicating more electronically than in person. He would miss the likes of Walter Cronkite style journalism while still being mesmerized by the speed and ease in which information is now shared.

Dad also believed in his quiet time. While not very Zen, his morning ritual consisted of coffee and a cigarette in silence. He would get up early so he could take some time to sit at the kitchen table quietly in his own thoughts. I never thought to ask what he was thinking about. I only knew to be sure not to interrupt his special time.

Mom and Dad opening wedding presents in 1951

My detox tech diet Day 6 continues on Father's Day. And in honor of Dad I will conduct my own version of his morning ritual. It will not include a cigarette but there will be coffee and silence and lots of thinking. Mostly about him.