Tag: dads

Life is a box…

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Forrest Gump’s mama was onto something when she said, “Life is a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.”

It’s better not to know, at least for me. I’d waste too much time worrying about what I most dreaded, the imminent Almond Creams, Butter Creams, Orange Creams, and—the worst—Liquid Cherries.

My single-minded efforts to change my fate and sidestep life’s unpalatable surprises would keep me from fully embracing the Chocolate Fudge, Coconut Crunch Cups, and Caramel Cordials that came my way.

Had I listened to my husband, I might have missed out on the bits and pieces of “Forrest Gump” wisdom. After viewing a preview for the film, Gary said, “Looks ridiculous. I’m not spending money on that one.” 

OK. Fine. 

I asked my dad to go with me.

Gary eventually saw the movie. I dragged him to the theatre and said, “You might like it.”

He did.

But I digress.

By the time Dad and I took our seats for that July matinee, he had been declared healed from a bout with cancer. He had no idea he was on the cusp of a second, similar diagnosis, no relation to the first.

In other words, Dad had already swallowed his fair share of those wretched “butter creams,” in the forms of surgery, chemo, and radiation. But like Forrest Gump, my father had a knack for finding positives in any situation and taught us to do the same.

If my brothers or I said a classmate bullied us, Dad said, “We need to pray for him (or her).” 

If we complained about a demanding teacher or coach, he said, “When it’s too tough for everyone else, it’s just right for me.”

Dad also could summon a laugh at a moment’s notice. He often kept his sense of humor intact when righting our wrongs. 

If one of my brothers misbehaved, Dad playfully warned, “Cross my line one more time, and I’m sending you to Pruntytown.” 

Pruntytown (in Pruntytown, WV) was a reform school for wayward boys that employed military discipline to teach self-control. My girl status earned me an exemption. And Dad chuckled every time he threatened. Still, the mere mention of Pruntytown gave me a shiver.

At the theatre near us, Dad and I relaxed back in our seats with popcorn and zero expectations. “Forrest Gump”unfolded on the big screen and wooed us in. We subconsciously crossed the screen’s barrier and become part of the story.  

Dad and I laughed. We cried. We said not a word when the final credits rolled, as though the slightest whisper might sever the magic. Given the choice, we would have remained in our seats and watched the film all over again.

A few years later, after enduring treatments following his second cancer diagnosis, a terminal Liquid Cherry found its way into Dad’s box of chocolates.

His response?

“Don’t cry for me,” he said. “God has blessed my life. I’ve had so many blessings.”

My father chose to focus on the parts of his box that had delivered countless Chocolate Fudge-Coconut Crunch-Caramel Cordial moments. The day we saw “Forrest Gump” together was a triple sweet one. 

After Dad received the incurable diagnosis, our parents called a family meeting.

“I want you to know I’ve arranged to be buried at the National Cemetery in Pruntytown,” he said.

In a flash, my brother Donald said, “Pruntytown? Pruntytown? All those years, you told us we were headed to Pruntytown, and you’re the one who’s going to wind up there!”

Laughter filled every pocket of air in Mom’s kitchen, Dad laughing the longest.

Here’s the thing about life’s box of chocolates: we can’t spit out the bites we don’t want, but we can choose to make the best of even the bitterest of them.

The stuff that makes us whole

On By VievesVineIn Throwback2 Comments

(Throwback re-post by request)

Funny how just a smell, taste, sight, sound, or a place can land us in the middle of a memory.

The scent of homemade bread puts me back at the table in my grandmother’s kitchen. At the sight of a child clanging a triangle, I’m a second grader again in Miss Hatfield’s music class holding out my fist for her to rap my knuckles with a ruler—probably for talking.

Whenever I hear Three Dog Night belt, “Jeremiah was a bullfrog,” I’m back dancing with my friends on the hardwood floor of the school gymnasium. The smell of a fresh, plowed field sends me racing between rows of tall tobacco plants across the street from our house in Kentucky, the soft mud squishing beneath my bare feet.

But I’m carried back to two special moments every time I play the third hole on the golf course at the Bridgeport Country Club, and whenever I hear the 1960s hit “Moon River.”

The summer the doctors added the word “terminal” to his name, my father danced over the green on Number Three. It was one of those days the sun lures golfers away from their day jobs to play hooky on the long, lush fairways. Number Three is also a par three, and my drive that afternoon dropped in the sand trap just below the green. Social golfer that I am, I was thrilled to land a ball anywhere near the hole.

Dad chipped up onto the green and waited for me, his hand ready to pull the flag. I laughed when I saw him, hat askew, fingers tight around the pole. I grabbed my sand wedge and trudged over to the beach. I hoped to only whiff the shot once, but I made contact on my first try, hitting sand first, then the ball.

I climbed out of the trap as my ball hit the short grass with a soft thud. I stepped onto the green just in time to see it roll into the cup. Dad howled, kicked up his heels, and danced around the flag. Then he skipped over to me, looped his arm through mine, and swung me ‘round and ‘round across the green.

A few months later, I danced one final time with my dad. The last leaf sashayed to a ground gone cold. Women wrinkled their brows over their first ponderings of a fat turkey stuffed at both ends. Men pulled blaze orange off their cellar hooks and prepared their guns in time to inaugurate buck season. Children, eager eyes toward December, sharpened their pencils for letters to Santa.

Me? I was with my dad, just the two of us. We were taking a walk around the house when he looked up into my eyes and said, “You’re not supposed to be taller than me.”

It was true. Cancer had reduced his frame, once just shy of six feet, by pounding him into a 5’4” cell. But he smiled, slipped his right arm around my waist and clutched my shoulder for support with his left.

“Let’s dance,” he said.

Dad embraced me, pressed his cheek next to mine, and hummed the bars of Moon River. Our steps were small and cautious, but he did not let the disease that stole away his strength take the lead. My father held on to me, and I held on to the moment.

We live in the present, as we should, but our memories are gifts. They warm us, lift us, and instruct us. Memories are the insurance that keeps special moments and the people we hold dear alive within us. The past is filled with the stuff that makes us whole.

Words from my father

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On Memorial Day, I visited my father’s grave at the National Cemetery. I hadn’t been there in a long while, and I wasn’t certain I could find it on my own.

Cemeteries aren’t my first choice to visit when I want to pay tribute or find solace. I feel my dad every time I step onto a tennis court. He’s everywhere I look when I find my way to Camp Mountaineer in Morgantown. He’s ever-present when I visit the Baptist Temple or wander up to Morris Park, both on the east side of Fairmont.

But no matter where I am, I hear him.

The tone of his voice when he said, “Genny Ann” or, on occasion, “Genevieve Ann” and his advice and stories and songs remain with me.

Dad often sang to my brothers and me. The songs he gave us, he also sang to his grandchildren. Now, we sing them to our baby grands. Like “McNamara’s Band”:

“Oh, my name is McNamara I’m the leader of the band

although we’re few in numbers we’re the finest in the land…

and Hennessy Yennessy toodles the flute and music is somethin’ grand

a credit to old Ireland is McNamara’s Band….”

And “Tora lora lora”:

“Over in Killarney

Many years ago…

“Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral, Toora-loor-ra-li,

“Too-ra-loor-ra-loo-ral, it’s an Irish Lullaby….”

And, of course, “Hail West Virginia”:

“It’s West Virginia, it’s West Virginia

The Pride of every Mountaineer….”

Dad would chuckle and lower his voice to a murmur when he recited:

“One dark night in the pale moonlight,

two dead soldiers got up to fight.

Back-to-back, they faced each other,

drew their swords, and shot each other.”

He reserved one song just for me, a tune from the early 1900s that I doubt anyone else recognizes.

“Oh, Genevieve, sweet Genevieve

the days may come, the days may go

but still the hands of memory weave

The days of long ago….”

The many Carolines whose fathers sing “Sweet Caroline” understand what “Sweet Genevieve” means to me.

Whenever my brothers and I went out with friends, Dad said, “Don’t take any wooden nickels.” It took a while, but I finally realized that was his way of issuing a witty warning: “Pay attention. Don’t let people fool you.”

We lost every battle for a later curfew. Dad always said, “Nothing good happens after midnight.” When we slept past 8 AM, he cautioned, “You’re sleeping your life away.” He was right–on both counts

A few times I came through the door in a rage—angry and complaining about having been treated unfairly by a friend or a teacher or a supervisor.

“What we really need to do is pray for her (or him),” said Dad.

“Pray for her? Pray for her? You pray for her,” I recall telling him once.

I didn’t get it then, but I do now. I still hear Dad repeating those words. His calm voice is a lifetime reminder of how to turn negative thoughts into positive activity.

When I arrived at the National Cemetery, a plan took shape in my mind. I drove up the American flag-lined hill as the reds, whites, and blues waved to me in welcome. I made the loop at the top and headed down to park and start my search.

I said to myself, “Self, just start out along this row, and check names three rows back.”

Halfway down the perfectly manicured green lawn, my father’s name in block lettering brought me to a halt. Below his name, his Navy credentials, and the necessary dates, I read the familiar inscription:

“When it’s too tough for everyone else, it’s just right for me.”

Dad said those words often as he helped my brothers and me learn how to persevere through challenging times in our lives. I heard him then; I hear him now.