In the early days of facebook I had some thoughts on the passing of my dad, and now, these days, I've had a few more as things have changed--some good, some bad. It was worth it to me to jot some down again on another anniversary of his dying. Eleven years on and it seems we have become used to him not being here all the time. It took a while, but sometimes that realization does creep up on me. Just last week I dreamt he and I spoke, but I can't remember why. But it was pleasant to "hear" his voice again even if only asleep...he always said I didn't listen very well.
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| Here we all were at Olan Mills. I borrowed one of dad's cardigans. |
Moving into this old house of his has sparked some memories of the family from back in the days of high school from '79 until '84 when I got "asked" to leave, and some are stark yet some are downright charming in a way.
To this day, when I go upstairs I feel a twinge of teenage angst! Like I have tons of homework to do, or I didn't mow like I was supposed to or I didn't take the trash out on time...or I didn't bring the cans back in on time...or I didn't attach the bungee to the tops of the cans correctly and the racoons had run amok in our trash.
When I open the door to step into what is now Emily's room I expect to see my mattress on the floor covered with the quilt mom had made for me since the thermostat was never above 65. My crappy "stereo" and my books and my clothes and my "stuff" are all supposed to be there. In the closet there's supposed to be my doodles, my painted eyeballs on the walls but like dad, they're gone.
There's also supposed to be a bowl of untouchable soap just for looking at in the upstairs bathroom, but it's gone as well.
Even the house itself has dad's signature carpentry skills on display to show how he'd tinker to fix things around here. I could make a list.
When a door dragged he'd cut the bottom off (or the top for some reason...I guess if it scrubbed the jamb) so in many rooms we have doors so far off the floor a beagle can fit her whole snout under the door and a Bacon Dog can slide her paws under--it's quieter than whining to get in I guess. Of course he used his shiny Sears Craftsman Circular Saw to cut them with, the only problem was that the blade was the one that had come with it several years before. So not only would there be a godawful screech as he cut, but also a little smoke and chips of door flying off as he butchered his way to a free-swinging door. When I poop every morning I see dad, or at least his handiwork on the bathroom door in the wavy, splintered cut on the top of the door.
When we moved in there wasn't a tiny spigot for the refrigerator's ice maker as dad had vowed to never own or use an icemaker. To the last day he lived here, he, and us before we all left, made ice by freezing water in trays and twisting them out into a tub...a reused Shedd's Spread tub of course. When we first moved in we dealt with those same tubs filled and frozen and had to chip our ice out with an honest-to-god ice pick, but thank goodness, in his later years he relented and got us those ice trays and I became famous for leaving one cube in so I wouldn't have to refill it!
"If you can't fill it up for us, do it for selfish reasons! So you'll have ice when
you want ice!" he'd say, hopeful and then later, disappointed...again. Needless to say, for mom's ghost I put in that little spigot for ice, and one day, for Lisa's sake, I'll get a new fridge worthy of it, but for now, yes, by god we got ice right out of the refrigerator door.
One of the weirdest things he did was put a switch on the closet door in the master bedroom that, like a refrigerator, comes on when you open the door, and turns off when you close the door. The wall switch was diverted to an outlet by a vanity and I can only pray to the minions of fate that he knew what he was doing. But alas, there's no heat register in the closet, so when I close the door to go to bed (because if you don't the light is on all night), I wake up to frozen clothes in the winter, and pre-sweltering clothes in the summer. I haven't put it back "to code" yet because I hate patching sheetrock and painting, so for now, when I lay my pants out to warm up, or cool off as seasons indicate, I think of dad.
Oh, and our thermostat is at a balmy 68 degrees. Because we're worth it.
One of the things I really miss about him not being here is that he never got to see our kids as adults. I feel like he didn't think I was up for the task of raising "cooperative, productive members of society". He hasn't got to see the old soul Emily is, wise beyond her years, and not as recklessly rebellious as yours truly. Or how Jaime is more man (real man, without all the bullshit bravado that's bloodied my nose and lost me friends and income) than I am and has been since very early on. Unlike dad and I, there's not a single conniving bone in his body...Emily? I dunno...gotta watch her.
He didn't get to see me settle mom's estate since he never did, and then see me settle his estate--me, brett...the guy who got asked to leave at the ripe old age of 17. Of course I had help settling those estates--not gonna lie--but it was it was a strange turn of events that led me to the task, that's for sure.
He didn't get to see me make his house livable after it had been a rental for several years and then sat dormant and vacant for several more years when we all thought the state of North Carolina was gonna put Gate City Blvd through it. Obviously the state didn't and now it feels like El Paso down by "the wall". Of course I've had lots of help and am gonna need some more, but for now it's...doable. I fixed the basement door, dad...and threw out everything you had hoarded in the collapsed barn. I wish you could've seen the bonfire I made. Jason Queen saw it from his office in the cab of a Norfolk and Southern locomotive as he passed by a couple of years before the wall got put up! True story.
Anyway, I just wish he could see I am not quite the loser he thought I'd be. I might be close, but I've fed me and mine and a handful of others and theirs just by keeping my hands dirty and sticking up houses. He didn't deserve the way he died fighting the same kind of cancer that killed John McCain, Beau Biden, and Sam Bottoms--not many people do. It robbed him of his intellect, his logical side, the side that knew he didn't have little bugs under his skin, the side that knew he didn't eat cereal without milk; I wasn't about to argue as he crunched away that morning during my weekly Sunday visits to give my stepmom a much needed break from being his caretaker. It was hard to watch. One morning he refused to get off the toilet, scared he'd have an accident, until my sMom got home from church.
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| Mom and Dad in happier, healthier times. |
So here's what I had to say about it on facebook two years after:
John Lloyd Mothershead Jr. 4-26-1934 to 4-7-2008
Dad died this same date back in '08. It was warm, and green, just like it is today. He had fought his brain cancer as long as he could until he was gone from us long before his body gave up its fight. It was cancer all right, and it was hard to watch as it robbed him of his personality, but when it was over, we all sighed in a bit of relief.
He was my dad, so at times I hated his guts, needed his help, and laughed at his jokes. He taught me to be systematic in almost any endeavour. He had been a mechanical engineer, and his whole life had become a study in logic and reason. I'm not sure if it were a result of his schoolin' or that he liked crunching numbers in the first place that made him a stick in the mud.
Anyway, you can imagine how fun it was for me to grow up with that outlook when I'm as footloose and fancy free as one can be without being a total irresponsible ass. But if it hadn't been for that influence, who knows, i might have become a pinche carpenter or worse...oh wait. He did manage to make me a happy medium of both (Pirsig speak) Classical and Romantic thinking I believe. Thanks for that, pops.
I miss that the kids don't get to hear the ol standard jokes he'd share, and the puns, and the arguments. And I mean the arguments in the classical sense of the word--not yelling at each other. You'd say, "I think perception is reality," and he's say, "What?!? No, you're...." and it was off to the races.
I miss that, and try some with my kids, but i have no panache for that stuff.
He was my dad. And he ain't here anymore, and I remember thinking while talking on the phone to Scott, my brother in law, that things should be different after he died. I had pulled over to talk on my cell phone and to turn the truck around to head back to Asheboro when they called to tell me he'd died, and people were whizzing by me like nothing was happening. But something was...
My step mom was left alone. And some of us wouldn't handle it very well, and some of us would. But dad was gone and I wanted to see the clouds roll in and give us three days of rain! But nope. It was business as usual. "Hey, Brett, sorry about you dad. When's the house gonna be dried in so we can call the roofer?"
So, tell your pops what you think now, good or bad, because the day IS coming whether it's YOU or HIM.
Of course, I felt the same way when mom died. And you'll hear about that in May.
End quote, and as a postscript, I'd say I
do have a panache for those silly jokes and endless arguments, and now so do my children...and may theirs too. I hope I'm around to hear them. Thanks for that again, pops.
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| Dad and my sMom, again, in happier, healthier times. |
PPS. I might be the only person you know with three mothers.
