My dad was not a people person. He had few friends and kept his thoughts mostly to himself. He worked long and hard at his job, sometimes accepting long-distance moving gigs which would keep him away from home several days. There was always food on the table and clothes on our backs.
I remember the time he got fed up with the treatment he was receiving at work from his boss and secretary. He had gotten the job as a mover through his father who also worked there. But more than just a mover, I remember driving down with him during the winter months on a Saturday or Sunday, to the warehouse where he would shovel coal into the mammoth furnace. I remember his little podium desk with the sheets of paper on a clipboard of things he had to do as errand boy, janitor as well as mover. He had had enough. He wanted better, and quit. I was 12 years old.
I remember mom teaching us kids a song to sing for dad when he came home from his new job as a delivery driver for Wonder Bread. We stood there and sang it to him as he walked in the door. He continued in that job for less than a year. He could not handle dealing with people on a daily basis.
I realize now it must have been extremely difficult for him to go back to the warehouse basically begging for his old job back. He was a proud man and, with this occasion, it sealed his fate for the rest of his life. They rehired him, but not without his loss of tenure. His dedication as a father and husband outweighed his personal pride and he returned to the job that his father had before him and one that, later on, I would also work at, with him, during the summer months. I dont think he knew how much it meant to me as a teenager to be working side by side with my dad at his occupation.
Later on, when I returned from Viet Nam, he and I would head out early on a Sunday morning to the local flea market and I would help him watch the tables as he set up items acquired from years of people discarding things and giving them to him when they moved. But we rarely talked about important things. Hustle was the name of the game and time was money to him. I wished we were closer.
There are many things about my dad and his upbringing, and our family history, I do not know about. He was distant in his socialization and, basically, lived day to day doing the best he could. I think behind that gruff exterior was a sensitive and caring man, one I never got to really know. I do know he was dedicated, loyal and faithful to mom and us kids. We were, evidently, his reason for living.
Happy Father’s Day, Pop.
