Posted by Kathleen Pooler/@kathypooler
“What a father says to his children is not heard by the world, but it will be heard by posterity.” Jean Paul Richter
I was blessed with a remarkable father, Bob, whom I looked up to my entire life. He died in 2010 leaving our family with a legacy of love and wise guidance.
Dad shows up a lot in my memoir; the symbol of strength and wisdom, the voice of reason, the calm in the storm.
Eight months before he died, I interviewed him. Typically, a man of few words, he spewed out a litany of stories on that day.
The man I adored and admired, my hero, was once a little boy with stories of his own.
Raw Beginnings
A blonde-haired four-year-old boy named Bob rides his scooter down the sidewalk, stopping to avoid the raised ruts. He squints to shield his sad blue eyes from the scorching sun, stopping to brush the thick shocks of hair from his forehead. Soon, he will be whisked off to a children’s home, along with his older brother, Dick and his older sisters, Ruth and Eleanor as their father works as a traveling salesman during the Depression. Their beloved mother, Edna Mae, is suddenly gone. Ruth recalled years later that Edna Mae suffered from blinding headaches until one day at the age of thirty-three, she died of a stroke, leaving Paul, her husband, to care for his four children. Bob, my father, was the youngest. Gathering them close in his magical sway, Paul reached out his loving arms and taught them to say,”All for one. One for all”, a refrain they would remember and live by their whole lives.
A strong, young father had vowed to protect them all from his deep pain and loss; a loss that sent waves into the next generation.
“I never understood how my buddies could be so rude to their mothers.” Dad would say,”Their mothers would bake cookies and greet them after school. I would have done anything to have my mother back.”
At the children’s home, he recalled cold, lumpy oatmeal and being bullied by the older kids. One day on the playground while playing baseball, some older kids surrounded him, taunting him about the knickers he was forced to wear. Dick, his designated protector, came to his rescue as he did many times before and after. The brothers shared a mutual respect and close relationship for their entire lives as did all the siblings.
And Dad could never eat oatmeal, often relaying his experience,
”Makes me gag and reminds me of the children’s home.”
Dad recalled his excitement the day his father brought him a box of chocolates for Valentine’s Day. He couldn’t wait to take it back to his room and savor the treats at his leisure. But the matron had other ideas. She felt it was only right that this treat be shared with all the children as others were not so lucky as to have a father to bring such a nice surprise. Excitement turned to disappointment as he watched his treasured box of chocolates get divvied up among the group. That does explain why he savored sweets in later years. In fact, one dared not get between him and his dessert, especially if it was homemade chocolate pie.
The children were released from the home one by one, starting with Dick. Soon my father was the only one in the home. He missed his siblings but looked forward to the day he would leave. He was twelve when he left and recalled a happy day filled with hugs when he arrived in their home in Schenectady, New York. Dick was six years older than Dad and had joined the Army. When he came home on leave, he and Dad played hours of tennis, getting up at dawn before the hot sun started beating down. Dad recalled that they would often wrestle. Dick would establish dominance, while grinding his fist into my Dad’s temple; brotherly love at its finest. He missed Dick’s playful banter and the trading of outrageous puns among the siblings.
Ruth, four years older, was the surrogate Mom, cooking, cleaning and doting over her mischievous brother while their father worked as a traveling salesman for a printing company to support them. Soon after Dad was discharged from the home, Paul moved them to Upper Darby, Philadelphia to find work. He would be out of town during the week and home on the weekends.
One Friday afternoon, Paul drove up with a strange woman.
“Meet your new mother.” He said as they walked in the side door.
Shock and disbelief registered in Dad’s twelve-year-old mind. Lydia was forty-years-old, a spinster by 1934 standards, when she married Paul. She didn’t understand the workings of a twelve-year-old boy on the edge of his coming of age. Her stoic German personality was in sharp contrast to a young man who was trying to make his way in a world of uncertainty. While he fought the bullies in the school yard, he balked at the stern limits set in his new household. He was a rebel in the making, sneaking off to smoke his first cigarettes behind the garage and developing an ever sharp edge to combat his fears and longings.
But his new stepmother was a wonderful baker and he loved her Apple Streusel.
For all her sternness, born out of her lack of mothering experience, she was a gentle lover of birds. Dad recalled his memories of their pet pigeon, Oscar, who would fly into Paul and Lydia’s bedroom and perch near Lydia’s head. When it was time to move back to Schenectady, New York, Oscar was placed in a wicker bird cage and set atop the children, suitcases and lampshades in the back seat of their 1930 Ford. Imagine their surprise when they found eggs in a nest. Oscar became Oscarina and soon after their arrival in their new home, she flew away. They later found out that Oscarina returned to Upper Darby, perched on Paul and Lydia’s bedroom window sill.
Dad was fourteen and full of himself when he moved back to New York. His edges kept sharpening as he found himself on new ground once again. I look at the picture of my fourteen-year-old father, tall and handsome with a shock of light brown hair, reaching down to pet Spiffy, their beloved Huskie and wonder what he was thinking and feeling at that moment.
In two years, as a junior in high school, he would meet Kathryn DiCerbo, a sophomore, in the hallway at school. She would secretly decide on that day that he would become her husband. He didn’t know it then that she would become “the woman of his dreams” and his life would be forever changed; the deep longing in his heart would be filled with the love and laughter of a big Italian family who would embrace him with open hearts. He would be welcomed into the fold and honored like the Prodigal Son. Let the feast begin; a lost son has returned.
And the sharp edges would melt away… (to be continued)
How about you? Do you have stories of your loved ones that you want to preserve?
I’d love to hear from you. Please leave your comments below~
Announcement: Congratulations, Susan Rowland. You are the winner of Andrea Lewis’ memoir, Dramaville is Not a Place; It’s a State of Mind.
This week: I am also over at Belinda Nicoll’s My Rite of Passage blog with a guest post on her “What is the Gist of Your Story?” series with My Memoir-in-Progress.
Next week : Memoir Author and Creativity Coach, Belinda Nicoll will discuss “What Do Writers Read?” She will give away a copy of her memoir, Out of Sync to a random commenter.
