I met my Father when I was about six months old on the platform at King Street Station in Seattle. Dad had just been discharged from the Navy. While I was being born he was busy participating in the Battle of Okinawa.
When he sailed for the invasion of Iwo Jima in December 1944, I was just the cause of Mom’s morning sickness. But there I was when he got home, the all-consuming center of my mother’s and grandparent’s world. Mom always said the abrupt introduction confused our relationship for life. To make matters more challenging, I grew to be a combination of both Mom and Dad: Irish and Scandinavian; hot and cold; composed and volatile.
Growing up I believed my Dad didn’t understand me but, looking back over 70 years, maybe he knew me pretty well. “Good God, that kid!” was the common complaint aimed at my way. Dad knew I was not dumb, but also that I would never be on the honor roll. He knew I had the same strong-willed personality as my mother. Advice and lessons of life had to be delivered almost off-handedly, in passing or in small doses. And those lessons and advice guide me to this day.
I attended a “reservation” school where my classmates and pals were Native American. I don’t remember the context, but the question of racial discrimination came up when I was about 9 years old. I asked my Dad about it. “How would you like it if you couldn’t get a job because you had blue eyes,” he asked. Well, I didn’t like that at all!
“You didn’t choose blue eyes and no one chooses the color of their skin. Besides it doesn’t mean a thing,” he explained. “There are good people and bad people and they come in all colors and shapes. Be friends with the good ones and avoid the bad.”
He taught me to respect education. “It is something no one can ever take away from you.” He taught me no real man disrespected women. One who did was a “Sad Sack,” a sorry character taken from the comic pages of the day. Dad was a pipefitter with a high school education, but a self-taught historian and economist. “You have to spend money (carefully invested) to make money.” Not only have I benefited from that knowledge, but his great-grandsons have and will for many years to come.
Dad didn’t always agree with my views as I studied to get my Master’s Degree in Political Science, but I know he was proud when the “Master’s Hood” was draped over my shoulders at graduation. After he died, Mom told me that during many-a-discussion Dad would throw in, “My son has an M.A. in Political Science and he says….”
My father’s philosophy of life was the same as Voltaire: “Question everything.” And he did. That philosophy was passed on to me. I have been called a cynic many times, but I consider myself (like my dad) a critic. A critic – unlike the cynic – will find plenty of fault with the way things are run but will also have suggestions for change and be willing to pitch in and help make things better if possible.
I wish my dad was still here – he would get a chuckle over this article. We argued too much over nothing. Yet, I suppose I was just being the person he taught me to be. Thanks Dad!
