Sunday, June 21, 2020

Father's day

And so it's Father's Day again.

The last Father's Day I had with my dad was in 1972. I probably got him a tie or something stupid like that, though the only time you'd catch him in a necktie would be when he was wearing his dress uniform. Which happened rarely.

But it didn't matter. Anything I did for the man was perfect. Before it became a common phrase, my dad already knew the sun shone out of my ass.

My mother behaved the same way, which may well explain some of my attitudes as an adult, but what I find interesting - also as an adult - is that she was almost jealous of how much he loved me. Like she didn't understand that a person could have that much love for more than one person at a time. That goes back to my mom's upbringing, and the scars that left her. Someday I'll be a good enough writer to write about my mother, that for now, I'll stick to Dad. He's easier.

He was twenty years older than Mom, which means he was fifty-two when I was born. He also worked a full-time and a part-time job, so I'm not sure how it is that so many of my childhood memories include him. He couldn't have been there as often as I remember him being. I think I just make more of the memories I have.

His work at the fire department was shift work, so his schedule changed. The worst was when he would get home after seven, coming up on my bedtime. I had already eaten, and was just killing time waiting for him. He would come in stinking of whatever fire had made him late, and all he wanted was to take a hot bath.

It was a strange quality time, the exhausted man in his bubble bath, the excited child sitting on the fluffy pink toilet seat cover, sharing their day, me asking one question after another. If I ran long and the water began to cool, he would turn the faucet with his foot and bring the tub back up to boiling again.

The other alone time I got with him was in the kitchen. He was a good, functional cook, as most firefighters are - he even taught my mom to cook when they got married - but when he was stressed or upset, he made candy. I'd wake to a gentle hand on my arm. L"go play in the kitchen," he'd say, and we'd sneak downstairs in the middle of the night and make fudge, or candy apples, or peanut brittle.

On one memorable occasion, we attempted a new recipe for sponge candy, and it boiled over on the stove top. We were still cleaning the kitchen when my mom stumbled downstairs at 6 a.m.

When we lost him, it was quick. He had bronchitis, with a wicked cough, something that happened every year. I woke up one morning and my mom told me he'd gone to the hospital. The first diagnosis was pleurisy, which sounded serious to a nine-year-old.

I was allowed to visit him in the hospital at the end of the first week, after my mom had been told it was lung cancer and that he wouldn't be coming home. The poor man - when I saw him I ran straight at him and slammed into his rib cage. I can't imagine how much it hurt, but also knowing him, he didn't mind a bit.

He died three days later. We moved not long after that, and my spectacularly unsentimental mother got rid of most of his things. I retrieved some of it from the trash and the donation bags, but it turned out she'd let some of him live on. Years later, I found his recipe cards in the back of her box, and quietly claimed them.

I still make his fudge when I'm stressed, though I don't always wait for the middle of the night.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

oh dear, this is so sweet - I love that you inherited the fudge!

Thank you for sharing your precious memories.

ceci

Cherie said...

Karen, thank you for sharing your most precious memories. The snippets about your mom are fascinating also. Precious memories, no matter how hard the real times were. Bless you.
Cherie

Cennetta said...

Oh Karen, That's was a lovely story about your dad. There is something very, very special about a father daughter relationship. I'm a daddy's girl to and understand how wonderful it is just to be in his presence.