Every morning after breakfast, my father had to leave for the foundry, a loud, hot place where they made stoves on an assembly line. He'd get his coveralls on, give his hair a final combing, and head out the door. And then it would happen. He'd pause, then turn. And suddenly she was there. Mom would be at his side, it seemed like magic. A quick kiss on the lips, (smack) and he would continue on his way. It was something I could count on, something that for some reason made me feel good inside. Later I understood what it was. It was love.
Earlier in their marriage, my mother told me later, Dad had had to work for CN, the railroad. It took him away from home for weeks at a time. "But he wrote to me while he was away." She never said anything more about it, but one day I was going through some things with her in their room, and I stumbled on a bunch of papers tied up with string. "What's this?" I asked. She blushed and nodded to me to go ahead and look. There were those letters. All the letters he wrote to her when he was on the railway. In them there was such longing, such love, such passion - not like what you'd read in Penthouse or even Cosmopolitan. But how much he missed her, how much he loved her, how very lonely it was without her. That's when it dawned on me. My dad was a romantic, and an incurable one at that. And she kept those letters. Secretly SHE was too!! I often had wondered where I got that. Who knew that I couldn't help but be one with both parents passing it on to me!
Within a short time the car would be working fine and the guy would reach into his pants pocket for some money. "Your money ain't no good here," Dad would tell him. "Put that back." He was like that. He enjoyed tinkering on cars, fixing little problems, making things right. It wasn't work to him. Taking money would cheapen it somehow, rob him of the joy.
He prided himself on being in control of his emotions. My grandfather, his dad, died because of a tragic tractor accident when I was seven. Dad went through the funeral, the burial, his face stoic. Afterward - many years afterward - he told me, "Nobody saw me cry." Translation : he cried. But never in public. Never.
I never met a man who worshiped his mother any more than Dad did. He talked about her cooking quite often, described it in detail. He'd worked in the woods with his dad and the appetites were large and in charge. Today the dishes his mom prepared would coat the old arteries up "real good" with cholesterol ... and NOT the good kind. But back then, they needed the extra energy stores that fat gave them. Anyway, my mother was a great cook, but Dad never complimented her all the time I was growing up. When we asked him why not, he shrugged and said, "If I told her it was good, she'd stop trying."
One day when I was in my late teens, though, Mom had outdone herself. We had company over, it was a house full and the kitchen table was groaning from all kinds of goodies. Turkey with all the trimmings, gravy made just right, the whole nine yards. We'd begun the meal and we could tell Dad was enjoying it. Every mouthful he seemed to roll his eyes up, yet he was getting more and more uncomfortable. Finally he couldn't stand it. "My oh my, that tastes good," he exclaimed.
We all stared at him in stunned silence. Then in a trice, Mom was gone from her seat. She bounded across the kitchen to where we kept the bread knives. She grabbed the biggest one, ran over to the door between the porch and the kitchen, knife raised above her head. Then with two strokes, she cut a quarter-inch notch in the lintel!! We were all so shocked that nobody said a word. In triumph, she put the knife away, and flumped back down at the table.
In the uncomfortable quiet that followed, Dad spoke up. "Now. You see why I never tell her it's good...."
The whole group erupted in laughter. Even Mom!
Dad struggled all his life with addiction to cigarettes. He had started when he was 5. His mom used to help him sneak tobacco out of his dad's pouch, and I remember him trying many times to quit - and failing. Mom had quit when I was a baby and she was on his case every day to stop. He couldn't. She got after him when he drank on the weekends, too. He just did it to be sociable and to feel good... couldn't hold his beer, and would fall asleep on the sofa. All in all he was mild compared to some. But nothing but tee-totaling was good enough for Mom, who had grown up in an alcoholic home. At the time I agreed with her ... and so when it came time for me to get married, I was concerned that he would show up at the wedding with liquor on his breath. I begged him to promise me that he wouldn't drink on my wedding day. "Please Dad." He promised.
And he kept his word, bless him! The day came and he was just - Dad, nobody else. He and I were about to walk down the aisle together in front of some 300 assembled guests, and I turned to Dad and slid my hand into the crook of his arm just before the first notes of "Here Comes the Bride" started. I thanked him for keeping his promise not to drink on my wedding day. "I love you, Dad." He squeezed my hand under his arm and leaned into me for a sideways hug. "I love you too, dear," he murmured to me ... so only I could hear.
Not until after the honeymoon did I see the photos someone took of Dad sitting with Mom, after he had given me away, with my 2-year-old niece on his lap. He was crying. MY father!!
I broke down and sobbed like a child. He really did love me. He really did.
I never forgot it. I never will.
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