My Mom and Dad were up from Georgia this weekend. It's been several months, so we had plenty to talk over and I was especially jovial since the kids had poured me a generous glass of wine because I was so tense. My Dad seems tense around our boys and has little to no patience with them, so as Macklynn was running in circles around the living room, I asked Dad, "Don't you remember being a 6 year old boy?" He said, "No," then corrected that he was in an orphanage when he was 6 and he could remember the older boys stealing his supper. He doesn't talk much about it ...and I was silenced, 'til I found a few questions to ask.
Dad is the oldest of 2 brothers and 1 baby sister. One day their mother went out to the yard and never came back. (Years later it was discovered that she started another family of 5 more children, then committed suicide.) His father was a serviceman and didn't find in himself to raise 4 small children, so the family stepped in, but they too gave up on them. They entered the foster care system and sadly Dad remembers being beaten with a power cord and eating cold food straight out of a can. I'm not certain of the order of events and ages at which they occurred, but the sister was adopted separately and the youngest brother, Jerry, found a home also. His adoptive mother, Cleo, said he was so lonesome for his brothers that she went back and adopted them - for him ...and never made any qualms about why. Jerry was always given preferential treatment. My Dad and the middle brother were even instructed to share their earnings with Jerry when they were old enough to work. It was really something of a Cinderella story, the bad and the good ...good only because Cleo was rather well-to-do, always keeping a maid and a second home.
The "good" soon reared its own ugly head in the form of aristocracy. Although it was a smalltime town, Dad was the student council president and star of the basketball team that was headed to state. Cleo disapproved of my mother's lack of pedigree. Mom's parents were farmers, sharecroppers at that, but they made an honest living and raised one child: a reputable, intelligent, hard working daughter. Cleo banned my father from the championships because of his relationship with my mother.
They are the high school sweetheart story: marrying young, making it on their own, Mom staying home while Dad went to technical school, having a girl and boy of their own and a little brick house out on family land, next to where her father worked the fields. When I was 4, my grandfather was shot and killed. I remember Mom wrapping me up in a quilt that night and putting me in our LTD. (Her mother passed away unexpectedly when our Megan was not much younger than I. I firmly believe that Mom's tiny nuclear family is why she clings so hard to civility for fear of losing just one member.) I do remember some other things about that life, from time to time, as well as having to move away from it when I was 10. It was the beginning of several moves and the downward spiral of Mom and Dad's relationship. For years I blamed it all on him, that he should've stood taller. Mom must've seen her part in things, though, because she remarried him after he divorced her in the mid 1980's.
In the midst of all the change and turmoil he created, Dad always worked hard, taking on as many as 3 jobs at a time ...and even so, was playful . Perhaps, we were protected from arguments, but I don't recall many divisive days. He was fun-loving: teaching me how to shoot a basketball out on the driveway, making school projects with (and for ;) me, horsing around, running off with us to the theater, and other things I'd like to remember but probably have shut away for fear of reawakening old wounds.
He has reached well deserved status at his occupation and is flown for consulting at factories in other states and even overseas. His work ethic is old school, but his visionary entrepreneurship has landed him a second source of income that he gladly shares when he sees a need. He affords his love of offshore fishing and all that goes along with it. He also revels in finding unique gifts for us and is quick to pass out big bills for things like traveling expenses. It's a family joke that his generosity usually comes with "words of advice". That's due in part to his "boss" mentality ...but mostly his desire for our success. I've never heard him say it but I know he works so hard and expects the same from us because he never wants to revisit any semblance of his childhood poverty. It's pretty interesting that my Mom works in Social Services to prevent and halt the very things my Dad suffered. (Also worthy of note is that my Dad's favorite thing to do, fishing, is my mother's least because she can't swim ...hmmm ;)
Dad and I have had some serious disagreements and misunderstandings. It goes unsaid between us, but I've known that the distance between our homes has been our saving grace. Yesterday though, he dressed with enthusiasm to go to Melody's volleyball game (filled up Miranda's tank), came back to dole out candy to all the kids, held a stick for a long time for the little ones to jump over on the trampoline, and watched the Alabama game sitting elbow to elbow, all the while joking and teasing. Truth is I like him, in spite of some awful choices he's made. When I get perturbed by his judgement or snide remarks, I choose to see him as that little orphan boy. And at the same time, I see a man who just turned 60 with an ailing back from constant busyness and building and full blown diabetes that would take him from me if it got the chance. I had the same kind of thoughts about aging when my mother hugged me to leave and, as an unusual gesture, held my hand for a few seconds. They were so soft ...and I felt like a girl instantaneously. Those high school sweethearts both turned 60 this year and finding ways to stay intertwined with them, in the midst of our opposing sides on my brother's new life, seems all the more important. My friends who have already lost a parent don't need any convincing about how brief our time together really is.
Dad never talks about God and that worries me. I know people who are damaged as children and never fully recover. I'm thankful that my parents protected me from the "elements" and that I never endured violent personal injury at the hands of another, nor the neglect of having physical needs go unmet. My hope is that hearing the searing words about an orphanage roll off the tongue of my father will reinforce to me that impressing somebody or being somebody, having things or getting things done, and mourning lost chances and chasing new ones are secondary to seeking lives that need rescuing. There's a "home for children" not far from us. Melody got involved in the life of a girl there 2 years ago. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about when I boldly question why we celebrate holidays the way we do. Do you think a child there benefits more from a fantasy figure named Santa Claus or another little girl who makes that wish list happen because Jesus led her to?
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