My relationship with my dad is tortured at best. I am the only of 3 blood children who speak to him. Both my brother and sister severed ties with him over 10 years ago. We have never had what one would call a healthy relationship with our father. In hindsight, I can see that my dad probably didn't know what he was signing up for when he became a father. Most of my childhood memories of my father aren't what you would call Norman Rockwell moments. Not to give anyone the wrong idea, they aren't Law & Order moments either. They just lack a certain father-son element. in no particular order, here are my top 5 childhood memories involving my dad:
1) Saturday morning drives- Every Saturday morning my dad would take us (my sister, brother &I) to my grandparents in Ludlow. He would drop us off there and then go out for coffee with the Boys. No, not those Boys. Just his childhood friends who all still lived in Ludlow. We would watch Saturday morning cartoons with my grandparents (I vividly recall the 10 Little Super Heroes episode of Spider-Man & His Amazing Friends) and then play in the yard with my grandfather. Baseball, water rockets, balsa wood airplanes. We would have lunch and then my dad would pick us up and bring us home.
2) Friday Night Poker nights- My mom worked nights as a nurse for most of my childhood. So Dad watched us. Friday night was Poker Night. Most Fridays that meant a baby-sitter. If we were lucky enough to have Poker Night at our house, I would get the chance to stay up late and watch bad NBC shows (again, a vivid memory- this one of Manimal) while my dad played poker with his buddies.
3) Buying me a comic book (This one surprised me once I started researching it)- I was in the hospital several times as a child. One of the times that was an overnight stay, my dad bought me some comic books. My memory is very sketchy as to when this occured, but I do remember two of them being Micronauts #36 and #37. How can you forget a cover like that? I had no idea who Nightcrawler or the X-Men were. But I had Micronaut toys, so I was happy. If he bought it for me within the first 6 months of it being published, he very well may have bought me my first comic book. I have always remembered G.I. Joe #2 as being my first comic book having swapped a bag of marbles for it. But G.I. Joe #2 came out 6 months after Micronauts #36. So I may have my dad to thank for my comic habit.
4) Fishing- One of the only "Father-Son" memories I have is fishing with my Dad. We fished a lot and it was usually just my dad & me. I wasn't very good at it and don't really have any passion for it, but it did make an impression on me. I recall my Zebco 404 rod and catching a rainbow trout. We had a small boat that we took out on Hampton Ponds in Westfield, Mass.
5) My Dad's Chair- My Dad had a La-Z-Boy recliner that was "his chair". After dinner, he would sit in that chair and read the newspaper, watch TV and fall asleep. Most of my "at home" memories of my dad are him in that chair. Or asleep and my sister and I rifling through his pockets for lunch money.
So, all-in-all, with the exception of fishing, I have no Father-Son memories from my childhood. I don't remember him being at my little league or basketball games. He never showed me how to change the oil in a car. He spent less than one hour trying to teach me how to drive before giving up (taking me on the Mass Turnpike as my very first driving lesson ended with me panicking as we were almost sideswiped by a tractor trailer) He never showed me how to shave. He just wasn't there.
So what brought all this on?
My dad and step-mother visited the kids this morning. It's their first visit this year and the second since the middle of last summer- the 49 mile trek from Western Mass being something akin to Odysseus's travels after the Trojan War. I'm told that getting through customs at the Worcester Airport is a bitch. But I digress. They arrived at 10:30 AM and were laying the groundwork for their departure by 10:45 AM. Can't leave the dog alone for too long. But again, I digress. Lex was very happy to see his grandparents, but I honestly think Loki didn't remember them. Loki wanted nothing to do with them; often staying two rooms away from them. Lex ate up the attention, but I could tell from my Dad's demeanor that it was too much for him. He made a couple of comments about Lex being active and gave me a pitying look as I attempted to help Lex with potty training. I realized that he was absent for most of my childhood (through what I can only assume was callous disregard-he didn't travel for work, never worked overtime, wasn't (as far as I know) a secret agent and hadn't moved out of the house; he just wasn't there) and didn't understand that this is the way toddlers are. After dispensing presents and some idle chit-chat, they left. Total time of visit: 61 minutes.
Some random observations:
- They spent 37 1/2 seconds visiting for every day they hadn't seen them.
- A leopard could have gotten pregnant, carried her cubs to full term and given birth in the time between visits.
- They were here 6 minutes longer than the commute to get here.
- The amount of time since their last visit is equivalent to 20.7% of Loki's lifespan thus far.
I sometimes worry that I'm not being as good a father as I can be; but compared to my "role model" I have to admit that I am doing a pretty good job.
