It is Father's Day and I am sure there are countless stories and photos about dads who are either still living or have passed on.
I was lucky to have a dad with whom I had a really good relationship. He was born in 1920 and grew up under very unfavorable circumstances. His maternal grandmother died 3 days before
he was born. He was born with a club
foot and spent many days at the Scottish Rite Hospital where they broke and
reset bones. He always had a limp and
special shoes.
While he was still a
child, his parents divorced which was highly unusual in those days. His mother struggled to provide for 2 boys
but his mother also suffered bouts of depression and could not find a job. Then the Great Depression came which forced
my dad to quit school and do anything to bring in money. He sold newspapers and picked cotton. They did not have a place to live and were
forced to live under their pickup truck.
In later years neither he nor my uncle would talk about those days. They literally lived on apples.
World War II came on the
scene and my father wanted to sign up.
Because of his club foot he could not fight overseas but they did accept
him as an air traffic controller.
He met my mother at a
church function in Okla. City and was determined that he would make something
of himself. He did not want my sister
and I to go through everything he had been through.
He was very spiritual and
began to look into various forms of spiritual organizations. Eventually he found Unity.
He never complained. I loved going to his house and drinking
coffee with him while we talked about coffee and religion. My heart was broken when he died in 1983 of
leukemia.
No comments:
Post a Comment