"It's My Daddy"

I wrote this several years ago as a Fathers Day gift to my Daddy. He died last month, but it felt wonderful to hear myself refer to him in the present tense. I need to keep his memory in the present tense forever.

“It’s My Daddy!”

That was the first sentenced I ever uttered. I think it was around eight months. I’m sure it is no surprise I was vocal early on. Obviously it’s no surprise how much I already adored my Daddy, even at such a tender age.   

My Daddy is big man with broad linebacker shoulders and upper arms that have problems in dress shirts. He’s also an engineer and so not the chattiest person in the world. He also mumbles-in a low voice.

My sister and I spent most of our growing up years trying to decipher his speech. My Mother could unfailingly understand and so became the family interpreter. This annoyed my father in the worst way. And, because he required translation, my father became known as “He” which also vexed him. 

“He” would say something at the dinner table. On cue my sister and I would turn to my mother and ask, what did “He” say?  This was almost always followed by a huff from “He”. Honestly, if it hadn’t been for my Mother we might never had understood a word he said.

Once at Thanksgiving he gave a long drawn out blessing. The family all nudged each other and giggled under our breaths because nobody had any clue what he was saying. After the droning mumble stopped, that’s how we all knew he was finished, I popped up. I had no trouble being heard or was ever short of words-I got that from mother.

So I said, “Daddy, no one understood a single word you said.”

Unfazed and in a surprisingly moderate and clear tone, reached for the rolls and said, “I wasn’t talking to you.”

I have NEVER lived that down. That was the last time I underestimated my Daddy.

When I was very little he worked shifts. Never being much of a sleeper myself I would wait, standing in my crib listening for the car in the driveway. Mother said as soon as I heard it I would start violently shaking the crib bars. (I’m sure there is a metaphor for my whole life in there somewhere but this is Daddy’s article, not mine.)

Anyway, Daddy would beeline to my nursery and swoop me up to, as mother relates, raucous giggles. I would demand to see the “tars” and out the back door we would go. 

He would show me all the constellations and the moon. I still take pictures of full moons and send them to daddy. He taught me to sing, “I See the Moon” also recorded in my very full baby book as the first song I ever sang. My sister swears she only has on page recorded in her baby book but that’s her problem. We don’t remember what my sister’s first song was. She was the second child.

He also made a point of watching for the first violet of spring. We always had a contest of sorts as to who could find one first. He usually won. Almost every book I owned as a kid has a violet pressed between the pages. Sometimes I win now and I mail them to him. He presses them in his bible.

As I got older he passed along his love of “The Tonight Show”.  That never sleeping thing of mine may just be his fault. I would beg to stay up and watch it with Daddy. Mother was a real stickler for bedtimes and she was obviously the one in charge and I was always told no.  So when she was reading in the living room Daddy would sneak me in the den and tell me to be still as we stretched out on the couch, me behind those huge shoulders, me peeking between his arms. 

Somehow I think my Mother knew. But it was glorious to think we were pulling something over on her. I have since learned that woman is psychic and even today when I’m a thousand miles away I know she knows stuff. I know she knows it’s four in the afternoon while I’m writing and about to pause to have a glass of wine—at four.

My Daddy was and is an adventurous soul.  I think he would have made a great explorer. He loved nature and he loved to fish and camp and travel.

Remember those old “Brady Bunch” episodes about the camping trips? Ours were never like that. They were better. We had the good fortune to live in Oklahoma City, the cultural capital of the universe, for a time. This put us four days from everywhere so the possibilities were endless, and so was Texas. 

Oh, how my sister and I hated Texas. Not the people, just the endless never ceasing straight highway accompanied by a scraggly fence. Swear to god that fence ran from one end of that state to the other. We would whine and pester our parents with the old proverbial, are we there yet?  Also followed by, are we out of Texas yet?

To which my Daddy would chant in a most taunting voice, “The sun is riz, the sun is set, and we are still in Texas yet.”

We hated that and he knew it. He also knew it would illicit screeches from two little girls in pigtails. The screeches seemed to bring a smile to his face.  Looking back it occurs to me Daddy had no trouble being understood when he wanted to.

We camped in every state west of the Mississippi. The Rockies were my favorite and I think Daddy’s too. We were southern kids so snow in June, or anytime, was an exciting novelty. When we camped in the spring or fall sometimes we got snow for real.  Oh that I could replicate the joy of waking to that winter wonderland!

But as in most things, one learns all is not always a marshmallow world, for Daddy was a tease and a merciless player of practical jokes.

Daddy would call me over pretending to have found something most interesting. I would come innocently skipping over to see what he had found- only to have him shake the overhead branch dislodging fifty tons of wet snow on my head. To add insult to injury he would snigger loudly, wheezing like pressure cooker about to explode. To this day my entire family gets tickled every time Daddy laughs. Even when we didn’t understand the joke (sometimes Mother refused to translate them) we still laughed because his laugh was so funny.

Of course this avalanche trick sent me wailing to tell my Mother who pretended to scold him through a not so well hidden smirk. In case you haven’t noticed I fell for this prank more than once. I’m still a sucker for my Daddy.

As my sister and I got older camping cramped our teenage lifestyles so my parents sold the camper. My Mother cried that day. I thought she was being silly. I have since learned better.

As it happens I saw less of daddy as I suffered through my teenage years, my fault not his. I didn’t fish with him much anymore. There is something about predawn starts that don’t seem so adventurous at 16. I didn’t play golf with him much anymore. The beach with my friends was more appealing.

Despite our callous neglect Daddy still spoiled his girls. We both got new cars before our 16^th birthdays. We learned to take him shopping with us because his solution to not being able to choose between two outfits was to buy them both. My Mother’s was if we couldn’t choose one we didn’t need either.

One thing Daddy and I did keep up was date night. I saw every war movie ever made in “Surround Sound”. I loved them! I also loved holding his hand through the whole movie. That was special. He always took me to dinner too-not some fast food place but a real restaurant with white table cloths and linen napkins. He always let me order an appetizer and desert and didn’t say my eyes were bigger than my stomach when I couldn’t finish my meal.

Not being the coolest kid on earth, truth be told I was a real nerd, I skipped my senior year and went straight to college. Daddy, concerned that I was so young on my own, insisted I attend an all girls’ school. I would have put up a fight but I was so glad to get out of high school I acquiesced. He and Mother drove me to college, about a five hour trip from home, and helped my roommate and I set up the room. Daddy kept hanging around and I admit I was ready for them to scoot. Mother sensed it was time to let the girls be girls and dragged him to the car. I remember hugging them both and not giving them a second thought as I headed to a dorm reception. I didn’t know for years Daddy cried all the way home. Mother had to drive.

Daddy has seen me through a wedding-a really big wedding with a live band and tents and all that goes with it. He was there at the birth of my first child, the one and only boy my daddy will ever have. He babysat for the new love of his life, my son, when my daughter was born.

He came and stayed with me when said daughter developed colic and screamed nonstop for six weeks. Daddy was the only who could make her stop. He would throw her over those huge shoulders and walk the neighborhood just to give me some peace.

Daddy saw me through a really nasty divorce. He made himself my children’s Daddy as well as their Papa. He welcomed a new man in my life and actually admitted he liked him. He and my son traveled to Alaska twice and drove once.

He fixes everything I break. But that is getting harder for him now. He was diagnosed with Lewy Body Parkinson’s disease about ten years ago. Daddy’s had a rough go of it. It won’t get better.

I don’t call him enough and lord knows I don’t visit enough. I stay on the road trying to get kids through college and make a living for myself. I’ve never taken my kids camping. Daddy has.

I am the strong woman today because my Daddy told me I could do anything and be anything I wanted to be. I am still trying to live up to his expectations and that is a good thing.

I see the moon,

The moon sees me.

Daddy hung the moon

And Daddy loves me.