My Dad Part 1 -- Impact of Childhood Lessons

My father always took care of our family and its needs. He was caring, kind, and worked very hard all of his life as a meat cutter. His education ended at the 8th grade. He took us camping nearly every weekend all summer long. We had nothing fancy like a trailer. But we had a huge old sheepherder’s tent. We spent many a summer night in that tent. I remember the last thing at night as he would make sure we were all tucked in our sleeping bags and then he would blow out the lantern. The flame would linger momentarily in the mantle and then, pop….it would be gone. Dark and just the sound of the water in the river. I also remember waking up in the cold mornings to the smell of coffee in the old beat-up coffee pot on the camp stove and my parents getting ready to fix us breakfast.

On some Saturdays, I would go to work with him at the grocery store and help out in the meat department (it’s no wonder I’m nearly a vegetarian today). I would stand on an upside-down milk crate so I was tall enough to wrap the packages of meat. I stocked the meat counter, put the price labels on each package, and took great care to make the coffee in the break room just right for the store employees. The more I think about it, not much has changed. He thought the world of me and was so proud when I was with him. I’ll never, ever, forget his smile….ear to ear….and consistent.

When I was close to 14, he said to me one day: “I’d like to take you to dinner. You pick the place and we’ll go.” He said later that he knew there was a problem when I got out the Idaho state road map and started looking….not in town, but for another city! I guess the travel bug had bitten me early in my life. I put my finger on a town I’d never been to: Twin Falls. And we went….just the two of us. A two-and-one-half hour drive from Boise. We had dinner at George K’s Chinese restaurant. I think it’s still there. On the way home, it was late and dark. He pulled the car over to the side of the freeway and said, “I think I’d like for you to drive us home tonight.” What? I don’t even have a license yet? But he knew that I’d already been sneaking in a drive or two when he and mom would leave the house. So, I drove 120 miles to Boise, in the dark, just he and I. You know, there are things that come and go in your life, or those that you’d just as soon forget. But this isn't one of them. I call those mile markers. Places to mark every long and happy mile of our lives.

I tell you, we had a ball growing up. I’ll never know for sure, but I think that my father wished, in some ways, that I was more “manly” and that I took a bigger interest in the things he was involved in. I remember helping him build a large shed behind our house -- roofing it, nailing what seemed like a thousand nails. It felt like a million bucks being with him and helping. He never gave me any indication that he questioned my sexual identity. But, that was the way he was with everyone. It just plain old didn't matter what you did or who you were. He was always your friend and would drop all he was doing to help you out. There were no limits or conditions attached. I can only hope that I’m half the man he was. Able to smile in any storm -- give of myself to help out anyone who needs it -- and have the energy and determination to make this life something special.