Old Man Anthology
Heather Paye, et al
Smashwords Edition
“You know, fathers just have a way of putting everything together.”
~ Erika Cosby
Papa’s Celebration Suit
By Salvatore Buttaci
The clerk at Hugo’s Custom-made Suit Shop tried to talk my father out of it.
“Sir, this suit would be more appropriate for a much younger man. Why, it’s practically white and the black pin stripes don’t help,” said the clerk.
I was beginning to think my gift of a suit for Papa on Father’s Day was not going to work out. We would leave here, and again this June, Papa would open my gift and say, “You sure know how to pick out the perfect tie!”
I knew the clerk was simply doing his job, applying his fashion expertise to help my father’s selection, but he didn’t know Papa, and for that reason I felt a bit sorry for the young clerk. My father was the least likely person to take anyone’s
suggestion once he had made up his mind. I kept my mouth shut as Papa touched the bolted fabric, smilingly ignoring the clerk who simply didn’t know enough to let my father choose whatever he wished.
“Sir,” he went on, pointing towards another bolt of gabardine, a somber solid black, “this might look better on you.”
My father’s ears were reddening, a sure sign he was getting, if not angry, than certainly annoyed. Then he clinched it by running a quick hand through his wavy hair, black as that fabric was, and streaked at the temples with silver gray.
“You saying I’m too old for the suit?”
“No, of course not, but—”
“But it looks like I’m not old enough to make up my own mind. Is that it?”
Now it was the clerk turning red. “Sir, I was only trying—”
“To help,” finished my father. “Don’t you think if we needed help, we’d call you? Looks to me like an easy sale.” Then to me he said, “What do you think, Sal?” I nodded, and he closed the deal with, “I’m sticking with this one. My celebration suit.”
“Celebration?” asked the clerk. I could tell Papa was hoping he’d ask.
“To go dancing in. We got some weddings coming up and I want to look good out there on the dance floor.”
The clerk made a face which he quickly dismissed by changing it to a beaming one. If this old guy in his seventies wants to act like a cool dude, guess that’s his problem, he thought for an instant and then gave in with a smile that read, “The customer is always right.”
Let’s get you measured up. It’ll take only a week before you can come pick up your suit.”
All Papa talked about on the ride home was that suit.
“Imagine that guy calling me too old,” he said.
“Pa, he never said you were too old.”
“I imagined it?”
“He just felt the suit was not the kind typically worn by older men.”
“I am not ‘typically,’” Papa said. End of conversation.
Yes, he attended several weddings in that suit. There, he would dance a string of waltzes with his niece Jenny, a tradition they both enjoyed for years. He attended a few family celebrations where he seemed to enjoy himself so much more than he would have in a different suit. “An old man?” he would say, a non sequitur I alone understood. “Can an old man dance like that?”
Less than five years later, Papa got lung cancer and died that April 1987. When we were wondering
what final suit for him to wear, Mama in her wisdom picked the one the man said was not for him. “Ma,” said my sister, “who gets laid out in this color suit?” but Mama said, “Your father does. He loved that suit.”
Seeing Papa lying there, radiant in the suit he loved, I kept thinking how he called it his celebration suit, and now, a new soul in Heaven, who could accuse him now of being too young to celebrate in Hugo’s suit!
“When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.”
~ Anonymous
Bits and Pieces
By Joel Blaine Kirkpatrick
Dad was a cabinetmaker. For forty-five years, our backyard was too cluttered to play in. Filled with every scrap of lumber he had ever held in his hands, we could have been burned to ash by an errant lightning bolt. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't junk. Dad knew every stick in the yard; there was some order to it all, which only he understood. But to me it just seemed worthless. Until yesterday.
Dad is not gone—I should clear up that notion. But that pile in the backyard, that small private lumber yard, it is going away. He's not happy about it, for a little while, and then he forgets again. Forgets that he was told by the city to clean it up… forgets that I'm here to do that for him. Forgets me, actually. Dad stopped being a cabinetmaker just two years ago. He stopped a lot of things then, stopped remembering family; the worst part of it all.
He had a stroke while making his last set of inlaid cabinet doors. They are right where he left them in the garage. No one could finish the project for him. No one knew how. I wasn't around to be taught.
Yesterday, I realized, quite suddenly, I should have stayed. My own life may have been happier. I learned such a heartbreaking thing, by opening a simple box on one of Dad's cluttered shelves.
Twenty-six years is a long time to be so stupid. At seventeen, I knew enough to leave everything behind, including my Dad. It wasn't to get away from arguments. Not to take on some glorious, world-changing quest. Stupid was the correct word to call it—that leaving—Dad told me it was stupid. Funny now, I always thought he was the one who had stopped listening.
The box marked 'bits and pieces' told me plainly; Dad had never stopped listening, or talking.
I remember my fifth Christmas like yesterday. Well, today I do. I did my fair share of forgetting, without needing a stroke to cause it. But, that fifth Christmas was quite special. One single toy survives after all these years. When I found it yesterday, I nearly cried. From what had been lost. Not that old toy, but time.
Still as freshly cedar-smelling as that very Christmas morning, the toy, a beautifully carved horse, which could stand on two hind legs, as gracefully as ever Trigger could—Roy Roger's famous horse—my dad had carved that for me. When I lifted it from the 'bits and pieces' box yesterday, I instantly recalled my exact words on seeing it, that Christmas, so long ago, “It's not big enough!”
Those words burned my heart yesterday; I couldn't help wonder if they had burned him that distant morning. Dad never said.
A year later, another wooden toy. Carved by his skilled hands, which made nothing else but straight lines of wood, with smooth polished faces—and never anything small. Dad worked twelve hours each day in his cabinet shop, two weeks for one whole set of kitchen goods. I couldn't guess how long he carved on the new toy, a dog, perhaps a few hours. Perhaps half a week? Dad never said.
But, my words were as harsh, at holding that second gift.
“I wanted a real one!”
Thirty-seven years ago, those words must have fallen in line with the first, "It's not big enough!", and began to form a chain, quite long by the time I'd had enough of home, school, toys that were only hand-made…and had enough of Dad. Thirty-seven years ago, I began to weigh him down, not noticing, not caring.
Somewhere in those years, fell the words, "Why do you waste your time?", and that present was set aside. He might have carved on that airplane for three days. I held it for three seconds. If he was deeply hurt by that? Dad never said.
More years piled onto my shoulders. What should have felt like growing up, instead felt like being compressed. I took most of my frustrations out in equal share: fights with Dad, Mom, fights with my brothers, fights with friends, which got me into a great deal of trouble. I was thrown out of school for two weeks, and spent every moment of my punishment in the cabinet shop, with Dad. He must have thought that would help me. Instead, it set me off. It seemed, every minute the machines weren't screeching, he was preaching. When my suspension was used up, I proved how wrong they had all been, how wrong Dad had been; I didn't go back to school. If that one thing disappointed him most? Dad never said.
The next school year, I did go back—to repeat the grade I tried to throw away. Those friends I'd left behind, or fought out of anger, they were all gone. They wouldn't have anything to do with me. A fresh group of faces came at me, already suspecting, already aware. That tenth grade year was my last.
If it broke his heart, he never really said. I stole a car and drove it hard to Vegas, too stupid to even make it half way there. It ran out of gas two hundred miles from home, and I walked until someone gave me a ride. Vegas didn't welcome me, but I tried to stay. That first week was hell, but, I had never been to Hell. I didn't recognize what I had done. Dad recognized it for what it was, and found me in three months. But all he said, was that it was a stupid thing to do. Nothing was said of jail, for the taking of the car. I'm sure the owner was relieved it only turned out to be a fool on a joyride.
But, I had forgotten to take any joy along, and Dad brought none; only money so I would not starve. He waited, outside the coffee shop, watching me through the windows, giving me time to come to something close to sense. He didn't wave as he drove away. Nothing else was said.
Within that box, those 'bits and pieces' I held yesterday, were gifts for the years that I was not at home. A foolish, aging cabinetmaker, carved toys for a son who had gone elsewhere. A son who deserved nothing of the care being given to the wood on his behalf. I had never seen those things. He had never said they were there.
It made me wonder, because it made me think about a childhood story, a man who carved the son he longed to have. Was my father carving me, all those years, in 'bits and pieces'? trying to make something of me, something I could not become without his delicate, careful strokes? The old box was full. I lined them all up, on the dusty remains of the unfinished inlayed cabinet doors, and saw a toy for every year I had lived since being so selfish at five. When I held the last one I had known, my seventeenth year, the year he carved a toy automobile, I realized those were the pieces of my chain, and their burden had not been his at all, but mine. I had denied something so simple as a wooden gift, and let the weight of my disappointment pull me down. He carved something every year for me, even toys, for a man, until the year he had his stroke. I had only known half of them. He had known them all. He had known me. I really was there.
My first real job, which finally proved that I might turn my life around, was at a marina on Lake Powell. I repaired boats for two years, and learned what I should have learned in High School, how to be responsible for myself. Cheap smokes and drink had cheapened me, and that job in the boat shop saved my life. Amid the toys on the dusty cabinet doors, was a lovely hand carved boat. We hadn't spoken in years, but somehow, Dad knew. He just never said.
I found some sense at twenty-five, and studied for my GED, earning enough respect finally, to be made a foreman on the construction crew where I toiled for years to forget my mistakes. The hardest work I had ever done, still did not teach me enough to send me home, or teach me that nothing I had left behind was worthless. I was building things at last, with my hands, as my father always had, but I could not understand, there were things at home to rebuild as well. None of it would have been hard.
When I heard a few years ago that his health was suspect, I still did not come, burdened with my own cares. Wealth had eluded me, times were hard, jobs had changed, and I still had not. Nothing tried, in all that time, removed the anger, to which I clung. I had only grown and aged, never truly learned. It was hearing he'd had a stroke, which brought me home, but less the news of it, than the pleading from my brothers. It was time I took up my share of their burden; it had exhausted them. It was time I resumed my place. They might have thought me responsible at last, but I really came home because it was finally easy. My life away—that had become too hard to bear.
That yard is nearly empty now; the garage was left for last. The city didn't care how cluttered that space might be. This wasn't a homecoming, really. There was no prodigal return. Just some weary thanks, and strained discussions about what the next few months may bring, what chores were mine to do. Few questions came up, about me, about my life; they had too many other cares. We are related, but they are the family. If that might be rebuilt someday, we have not yet had the say.
In Dad's garage, from within that tattered box, came toys which he made, and each represented
parts of me, parts of what I became. No words between us for years, but a message nonetheless. He knew of me, knew what I had done. I looked at those unfamiliar pieces of wood, and found familiarity in their form, they spoke to me at last, told me where I had been. They told me of myself.
Together, they told me of him, my father. No longer a chain of hurt or disappointment, no longer a weight on either man's shoulders, they had become links between us, which had more strength than words. They became the words he had never really said, the very words that he could no longer say. Though for years they had no power to reach me, yesterday they became precious.
What I had found, and could finally touch, he had always held. What I would not receive, from anyone, he had given for years without fail. There must be stories within that box. I should listen, though he may be unable to tell them. Mom may know. My brothers might. Someone surely does. Of all the things I've hauled and carted away, all the items which have no purpose now, this box of 'bits and pieces' will remain. Within it, is the home I left. Within it, is the life I might have lived. That is something I should stop to learn.
“Don't worry that children
never listen to you;
worry that they are
always watching you.”
~ Robert Fulghum
Remembering Dad
By J. M. Levi
As I near the corner of the bathroom door, searching for my two-year-old little girl; she stands, back against the door-jam, gaping mouth, moonlight colored locks, and eyes wide with awe. I bend towards, squatting down as my knees buckle to get a closer investigation into the situation and a timeless hug of her soft, warm skin. Nearing her ears, I whisper, “What are you doing?”
Never taking her eyes off the thing of interest, finger painting and poker-faced, “Dada!”
Not really noticing before, my full attention turned to the mirror. Standing there I began to regress to years gone by until my frame stood side-by-side with my little one. Both of us staring.
Who is that man shaving in the mirror? Was he Santa standing there with a white, shaving cream beard? Twinkling eyes and being the same color as dad’s? Not noticing our presence, the man made faces, moving his lips from cheek-side to the other and staring intently at his own reflection. The white beard slowly came off with one magical swipe after another, the swiping scraping his scraggly whiskers and the tap, tap into the sink basin with each swipe.
***
Every Sunday without fail, the ritual took place. The mug and whisker brush full of foam as father lathered up his face like Santy himself. The scent of spicy aftershave soon to follow. That man with the curly, black hair looked so serious as he strategically swiped the stubble with the razor. The pokey hair that appeared every Saturday, reminded me of the cacti in the desert, soon gave way to the warm smoothness I had grown eager to hug.
I knew what would follow. When Father grabbed the towel one last time and patted the rest of the shaving cream off, his attention would turn to me. The straight face turned into a devilish grin and Father, turning to me, “What are you doing over there?”
I always became worried that he might scold me for spying so ducking on the other side of the door way, my eyes peeked around at him—one at a time. Oh the smell of sweet spice and he always bent down and picked me up, hugging cheek-to-cheek. The face felt oh, so warm and smooth—softer than my teddy bear and smoother than my favorite velvet, blue dress. This time belonged to Father and I. No one else. I tasted his cologne cupping his face in my two tiny hands and giving him a peck on the cheek. Afterwards cuddling deep into his chest feeling the comfort and safety within his strong hug.
***
Father had been long gone nearly two decades. Now here I stand, tears streaming down my face as my husband turned to my daughter with an impish smile on his face. One brown-straight tousle of hair covering one blue eye.
“Come here, Sweat Pea.” Arms outstretched.
“Father,” I whispered as I backed my way out into silence, wiping the wet off my cheeks while leaving the two in their own private world. Walking away, I hear the muffled chatter and giggles...
I grab a frying pan and slap it on the burner—soon the house will smell of bacon and breakfast. Until next time.
“It is a wise father
that knows his own child.”
~ Francis Bacon, Sr.
A Dad’s Love
By Jessica Kennedy
From the time I was eight until twenty-one years old, I yearned for a father. When I was seventeen, my mother married for the fifth time, and I expected this man to be a poor father like his predecessors.
The walls I built to protect my heart came down slowly. He did not attempt to tear them down, but little by little, he weakened them with patient loving kindness.
He taught me to play golf and helped me catch the wild kittens that hid in our garage. They darted in between boxes and he tried to catch them. They yowled, hissed and scratched. Determined to escape, the tiny fur balls fought like lions. His arms bore the bloody scratches of their escape attempts. He never complained.
During the golf lessons, I tried to watch my stance and avoid slicing the ball. Golf was not my “thing”. He patiently guided my strokes. His big grin and bushy eyebrows framed a face of mirth, never frustration. “Nice try.” and other words encouraged my pitiful attempts to follow his instruction.
“Steve, your fettuccini is better than Mom’s,” I raved.
“You think? I’ll make it more often.” He beamed with pleasure.
“Thanks.” I savored a mouthful.
Steve shook his head. “It’s just a package.” He flushed from my praise.
I loved the fettuccini, but more than that, I treasured sitting on a barstool talking with him. He prepared fettuccini twice a week for dinner. Eventually, I dreaded eating it, but I enjoyed the time we spent together while he made it, too much to ever tell him.
He held me while I sobbed, because I had never known my father. I held him when he cried, because he had not been able to spend enough time with his daughter after his divorce.
The fact that I quit high school, never swayed his belief in me. He gently nudged me to seek higher goals. Throughout junior college, he tutored me in algebra, economics, statistics and philosophy. With encouragements, such as, “You can do it” and “You’re so smart,” I believed anything was possible. Grinning from ear to ear, he clapped and cheered the day I walked across the stage and received my Bachelor of Arts degree in history. The words, “I’m proud of you”, meant more than the degree I had studied for five years to gain.
The year prior to my graduation, I asked Steve a question. At 21, I craved a man I could call my father. “Steve, I have an important question to ask you.”
I trained my eyes on the ground. I wondered, should I ask? What if he says, no? So much of myself would be laid bare. With one word he could break my heart. Dare I ask? He took my chin in his hand and brought my eyes level with his. “You can ask me anything. You know that. Don’t you?”
This was a man I could trust with anything. I refused to listen to the doubts that raced through my mind. I plunged ahead. “Will you adopt me?”
Tears slid down both our faces as he hugged me and said, “I’d love to.”
Five years after he adopted me for my twenty-first birthday, I had a brainstem stroke and became a ventilator-dependent quadriplegic. Four months after my stroke, Steve was diagnosed with cancer and had his right lung removed. He tried to continue working, but found it physically impossible. After Steve was deemed 100-percent disabled, he assumed my care.
I had caregivers from eight to five each weekday, and during those hours he caught up on sleep, ran errands, scheduled my medical appointments, filed insurance claims, cleaned the house and cooked dinner. In the evenings and on weekends, he fed me and gave me fluids every two hours, and cleared my lungs of mucous at least every three hours to help me breathe.
He slept in the extra bed that was placed in my room in case I needed help during the night. Many times when I was sick, I woke him every forty five minutes to assist me. When I was well, he still got up with me once or twice a night, giving me a smile, making me feel loved.
I was unable to speak, so I made a clicking sound with my tongue to call for assistance many times each evening and throughout the days on weekends. Regardless of the reason I summoned him, he came, whether it was to straighten my covers, adjust my shoe splints, apply lip balm, clear my lungs or tend to me in any one of a million ways.
Out of the endless nights Steve took care of me, I heard him grumble “Damn” once. This was after I caught an upper respiratory infection that lingered for two weeks, and he was exhausted from getting up every 30 minutes to clear my lungs of the mucous lodged in my trachea. Never again did I hear him complain. He has never shown resentment or anger, yet he is only human and had to have felt it at some point in the past seven years.
An immense amount of guilt weighed me down, because I watched as he grew older and my wants and needs consumed his every minute. I thought these were the years he should be relaxing and enjoying retirement. I voiced these feelings once.
“Don’t you know I don’t begrudge even one minute I’ve spent taking care of you.”
Whatever I wanted or needed was his top priority. When the days were long and my spirit became defeated by the vagaries of my disabilities, Steve selflessly wiped away my self-pity and made me feel wanted and deserving of his love and a life. He made the unbearable, bearable by simply being Steve. I call him Steve even today. You might wonder why I don’t call him Dad, Daddy or Father. He was and is so much more than that. He’s Steve. Today, tomorrow, and always, I will cherish the gift of his love. I can only say thank you, but the words could never express all I feel.
“A father is a fellow who has replaced the currency in his wallet with the snapshots of his kids.”
~ Unknown
Raise
By H.C.Paye
He sat across the table, cards fanned neatly in hands. Even though his were concealed behind black sunglasses, I knew he stared back at me thinking he knew my next move. I glanced down at the pair tens in my hand restraining a smile with all of my will power.
“Raise,” I muttered, in a flat tone only a poker player could have.
This stranger sat across from me gritting his teeth. If he even called, he would be all-in. With him calling my raises this far, I didn’t think he’d waste so many chips. He laid his fan of cards face up on the table. “Fold.”
Now my smile couldn’t be restrained, I let my lips curve into a friendly smile. Ending this hand, I set my cards face up on the table. He examined my hand as I examined his—three sevens.
“Players are now on break,” the dealer announced.
I stood up, glad for the break to clear my head and start fresh again. A clammy hand touched my arm and I turned to see my anxious wife. I clasped her hands and pressed my lips to her soft cheek.
“You look worried.” I flashed a charming smile.
“It’s the last opponent.” She followed me away from the table and further into the crowd that dispersed. “It’s intense.”
I shoved my hands into my pockets. “This guy doesn’t know what he’s doing.” I walked back toward the benches. “Quite frankly, I don’t know how he made it this far.”
Squeals of “Daddy!” sounded from my son and daughter sitting patiently on the bench.
“Hi, kiddos.” I gave a brief chuckle then sat down beside them. My wife sat opposite them. I stared back at the poker tables, all of them now empty except for the last one. I could taste the sweet victory all ready. He was an easy opponent. It was an easy win.
I turned my head to look at my wife; she had her cell phone out, texting vigorously. I silently wondered to whom she was texting and if she mentioned me at all. She paused her texting, looked up at me, smiled, then stared back at her phone.
The room started clearing as people returned to their seats, and the dealer returned to the table. The opponent emerged from the crowd and headed toward the table. I arose from my seat and bent to give my wife a peck on the cheek.
“Good luck,” she said.
I strode to the table and returned to my seat. When I settled into my seat, the dealer began passing out the cards, and I collected mine in a tight fan in front of myself. I inconspicuously watched the opponent collect his cards trying to steal a peek at any card he might have, but he kept his cards under tight wraps, snagging them up as quickly as the dealer laid them down.
Glancing at my own hand, I noted the three spades right away.
“Raise,” the opponent said. He pushed several chips into play.
“Raise,” I mimicked and pushed several more chips into play.
“Call,” the opponent said.
The dealer laid down three more cards in the center of the table. One of them was the ace of hearts, and I wondered the chances of the opponent having another ace. The other two were irrelevant to improving my hand.
“Raise,” the opponent said, following the same motions as the last round.
“Raise,” I repeated. It would either be the rise or fall of me, but it was a chance I wanted to take.
The opponent was sizing me up, I could tell through his dark sunglasses. “All-in.”
I didn’t think he would be bluffing this late in the game, so I assumed his hand was a good one. I glanced down at my own hand. I already had a three-of-a-kind and there was a decent chance that I would have a four-of-a-kind before the end of the hand. “Call,” I announced.
The dealer finished laying the cards down, sure enough, there was another spade in there. The opponent laid his cards down. I scowled. He had a full house. I laid my cards down in defeat. I had very few chips left and I knew that if I didn’t win the next hand I would be out.
The dealer collected the cards, the opponent collected his chips, and I waited patiently for the next hand to be dealt.
The cards were handed out and right away I noticed my pair of queens shining a beacon of hope in my hand.
“Raise,” he said.
I felt compelled to curse under my breath. This would me I was all in. I decided to go for it. “All-in.”
The dealer laid out the rest of the cards in the center of table. There was nothing to improve my hand. The entire game was riding on my pair of queens. I chewed the inside of my lip.
The opponent laid his cards down on the table. It was an ace, two of spades, queen of diamonds, another ace, and a king of clubs. I laid my cards down slowly.
“The winner of the 2011 Poker Challenge is David Gonzales. Congratulations, David, you can pick up your prize at the north desk. Thank you for playing!” the dealer announced as the players departed the table.
I walked toward my family with a smile forced on my face.
My children ran towards me and I squatted to their level to receive hugs from them. I knew they were tired of waiting of sitting still and behaving for hours.
“Did you win, Daddy?” My daughter looked up at me with her golden curls framing her face.
I embraced her a little tighter. “Nope, Daddy didn’t win, but he tried his hardest.”
My son took a step back from me. “Can you play Go Fish with us now?”
My grin broadened. “Absolutely.”
“A truly rich man is one whose children run into his arms when his hands are empty.”
~ Unknown
The Man of My Dreams
By Jessica Kennedy
At the age of six, I learned my father was not my father. My three sisters and I congregated in the craft room. Construction paper, paint, yarn, and magazines peppered the room. Each pursued her own project. I finger-painted on a canvas and myself in the center of the room. Tara sculpted clay on a long table decorated with paint stains, glue, and the refuse from dozens of art projects. Mary sewed a wrap-a-round skirt at the trusty Singer machine. Yolanda lay across the daybed in the corner behind me and wrote busily.
“What ya writing?” I asked.
“A letter to dad.”
“Phil’s my dad,” I said, sassy and as if a matter of fact. Where was her dad? I wondered.
“No, he’s not. Emory’s your dad mine and Tara’s. Mary’s got a different daddy, too. His name’s Tommy.” I blinked in disbelief. My other two sisters nodded.
Emory, my mother’s second husband, and mom divorced just after my first birthday. Mom never hid the fact, but I never came to the realization that Phil was not my dad until that day in the craft room. Mom and Phil married after I turned two. As far back as I could remember Phil was my dad.
Cold indifference described his treatment of me. I followed him astride the white banana seat of my cotton candy pink Huffy bicycle pedaling as fast as I could to keep up. Streamers flew outstretched from white handlebar grips. I spent hours massaging his callused runner’s feet. I attended his marathons. A consummate mimic, I cheered the Pittsburg Steelers on television when he did even though, I hated football. I tried everything I could to break through his cold shell. I failed.
My mom and he divorced when I was 8. The only father I’d ever known left. Security evaporated. Phil disappeared from my and my sister’s lives... never to be seen or heard from again.
Mom remarried and this man was so different from Phil. Gene talked to me and listened to what I had to say. He took my mother dancing and on trips to islands in the Caribbean. Fun . He was fun, too much fun. He drank excessively. About 6 months into their marriage money problems surfaced. He lied constantly about money. The Internal Revenue Service and numerous creditors clamored for payment. Married in Texas, a community property state, his old debts became hers.
Whenever he and mother argued he took all of us girls shopping. We saw through his manipulations, but we enjoyed the fruits of them and the debt increased. Mother was determined to make the marriage work. She tried for a few years. No matter what she did she couldn‘t change him. An alcoholic is an alcoholic. Until they decide not to drink anymore, they will do and say anything to feed their addiction.
After my mother and Gene divorced, I never saw him again. Once again fatherless, (not that he was much of a father) I was bereft. I attempted to initiate a relationship with my biological father, but he was resistant. I thought I would never have a dad.
Without a daddy, I prayed for a man’s unconditional love. As a teenage girl, I thought the answer to my prayers were to be found in the arms of a teenage boy. I desperately clung to their words of love. Their love was temporary; when the sex act ended so did their feelings. Each encounter failed to fill the aching need.
At age 17 we met. I think he was 45, with silver hair and kind laughing eyes. The day I met him, I began putting up walls to protect myself. Mother’s husbands had not provided me with the daddy I craved. My sisters and I looked at this new man and assumed he was like his predecessors.
I guarded my heart and refused him entrance. With words and deeds I pushed him away. Regardless of how poorly I treated him, he repaid me with kindness. The years passed and his even-tempered constancy began to win me over.
All of my sisters had families of their own. Steve was an excellent grandpa. He tickled, teased and shared his cookies with each grandchild and they adored him and my sisters and I started to love him. I think the treatment of those cherubic faced children taught us he could be trusted with our injured hearts. I found a man I could believe in unreservedly.
I remember days with fondness that he spent patiently teaching me how to play golf. I never mastered the game. The time, patience, and enthusiasm he instructed me with were what I prized. He wanted and enjoyed spending time with me. He pursued a father-daughter relationship. This was a first.
Four years after we met and one week prior to my 21st birthday, I helped him take out the trash so that I could talk with him alone. I had never wanted anything this badly. With the answer no, to one question he could break my heart and I would never recover. In a haze of fear, I took a deep breath and tried to pool my courage. “I know what I want for my birthday.”
“What?”
I stuffed my bag into the large rolling green trashcan provided by the city and tried to swallow the fear. “I’ll understand if you say no.” That was a lie, if he had said no, the words would have crushed me. I couldn’t have understood or accepted a refusal. I didn’t have to ask that question. Other possible requests flitted through my mind. Can I borrow your truck for a camping trip, get a laptop computer, or money? Any of these questions would have provided a believable replacement for my true request. He had no idea what I really wanted. I closed the green lid and plunged ahead anyway. I asked.
“Will you adopt me?”
I glued my eyes to the trash receptacle and held my breath as I waited for his answer. When he didn’t respond immediately, my heart lurched fearfully in my chest. I turned slightly toward him and my eyes lifted to his tear drenched smiling face. “I’d love to.” His arms came around me and the tears from a lifetime of disappointments from men unable to be a father were spilled for the last time and the years of disappointment and heartache were washed away.
Twenty-one years old in a courtroom in Placerville, CA my dream came true. We sat on a wooden bench together with fingers intertwined. He squeezed my hand. Terrified he would change his mind; I waited, smoothed my simple white dress, and chewed my bottom lip. I wondered if the judge could refuse us. Would they allow me to be adopted at age 21? After the bailiff called our names, I went through the motions in a fog of happy disbelief. The judge congratulated us. I couldn’t believe my luck. I remember I thought, finally, I have a daddy...the best daddy, Steve. Thanks Dad. I’ll never be too old to want a daddy.
“Look in your shadow
and you’ll find another shadow
watching your every move.”
~ Anonymous
My Day with Dad
By Aaron Paye
It was a sunny day, the sky was blue, and the grass on the lawn was green. So we decided to go to the golf resort.
We got in the car, and drove there. After we arrived, we unpacked our gold clubs and started playing. Dad taught me how to hold the golf club the right way. He hit the golf ball first so I could see how it was done. He got a hole-in-one, and I said, “Wow!”
Now, I stepped toward the golf ball and took a swing at it, just how my dad showed me to. I watched the ball fly into the air, and then it landed a few feet in front of the hole and rolled right into the hole—I got a hole-in-one too!
After the game, we went back home and played golf on our Wii, even though he beat me on the golf course, I won playing the video game.
It was the best day ever!
About the Authors
Salvatore Buttaci
Retired from teaching, Salvatore Buttaci is an obsessive-compulsive writer who writes everyday. His work has appeared widely. He was the 2007 recipient of the $500 Cyber-wit Poetry Award.
His collection of 164 short-fiction stories, Flashing My Shorts, is available from Amazon.com at http://tinyurl.com/26u8huk
His follow-up collection, 200 Flashing Shorts, was released April 24th, 2011.
He lives with his wife and soul mate Sharon in West Virginia.
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H.C.Paye
H.C.Paye first picked up a pen and started writing when she was about six-years-old. It started with simple lyrics, but she soon moved on to short stories, and finally, which she was 10, began writing full-length novels.
When Miss Paye is not writing, she is an editor at Joyfully reviewed and a Graphic Designer. During her spare moments, she enjoys entertaining her Twitter followers with her random quips about everything.
Find out more at - http://hcpaye.webs.com
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Joel Blaine Kirkpatrick
http://thetaleisthething.blogspot.com
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Jessica Kennedy
http://jadaykennedy.blogspot.com
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J.M.Levi
http://jmlevi.webs.com
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