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My Dad was a very
private person. He never showed any tenderness towards his
three girls and most especially his son. It was as if he had
a blind spot where his children were concerned. I was only
ten years old when he died, so I didn??™t get to know him very
well. But I would guess he was afraid if he demonstrated
love or any tenderness towards his children, they would
think he was soft and would try to get away with things he
considered wrong. Therefore, he was the strict
disciplinarian. What he said was law. If you broke his laws,
you were punished. I recall my sister did something he
thought was wrong, she went on a bike ride with a boy, on
the boy??™s bike. She went at night, so my father was
concerned for her safety. When she got back, she got a
switching with a switch. She never did that again. My older
sister did something, which I can??™t recall what it was, but
we were worried about her safety also. She got a spanking
with a wood shingle. She said later, ???it didn??™t hurt, all he
did was hit the tail of my dress???. But she screamed with
every blow as if he were really hurting her.
Then there was
the other side of him. He used to put me and my sister on
his back and swim across the river; one at a time of course.
He used to tell us stories of what I would consider
supernatural experiences, ghost stories. I suspect he made
them up just to entertain us.
When he was paid
for helping a farm family bale hay or butcher a hog, he
would take us to town and get groceries (or food) and he
would buy a ring of bologna, a pound of cheese and a box of
crackers. The second story of the grocery store was where
the grocer lived. There were steps on the outside of the
building and we would sit on the steps and eat lunch. Of
course, he bought us a soda. My favorite was Orange Crush.
It doesn??™t taste the same today. Every time I got sick with
a cold and fever, I would ask for an orange or an orange
crush and my Dad would do everything in his power to get it
for me. I thought that made me well.
Once he went
hunting and brought back a baby rabbit whose mother had
abandoned it. Another time he brought me home a puppy in the
bib pocket of his overalls, which I named Buster.
He was a good
gardener. We always had a garden in the spring time.
I remember Mom
cooking green beans with bacon rind and new potatoes. I
recall eating freshly picked tomatoes right out of the
garden, with green onions, bib lettuce and corn. He used to
go down on the river bank and pick a whole dishpan full of
wild green onions, bring them home and get some lettuce out
of the garden and make wilted lettuce. He was a good cook.
My mother was sick a lot and he did much of the cooking.
Once my Dad took
my sister and me to a black church after my mother died,
which nowadays would be called African/American. I certainly
don??™t understand that either. If they were born in this
country, why don??™t they call themselves American/Africans?
That would seem the logical thing to me. To say
African/Americans would seem to indicate they were born in
Africa.
Getting back to
my Dad; he wasn??™t much on demonstrating his love with hugs
and kisses or saying ???I love you???. But we knew he loved us.
The one time he demonstrated his love and affection for me
was one day when he took me to town with him. I can still
see the corner of the street where we met an old friend, Mr.
Koontz. It was right in front of the bank and the big clock
was there over the bank. The two men exchanged pleasantries,
???How??™ve you been,??? ???How??™s the family???, etc. Then my Dad put
his arm around my shoulders and said, ???This is my baby???.
That said volumes to me. It not only indicated his love for
me, but that I was important enough to introduce to an old
friend who he hadn??™t seen for quite some time.
No, my Dad wasn??™t
the kind who was always hugging and kissing us or telling us
he loved us. I wish he had been, maybe that would have
changed the way I raised my kids. But the love was there,
with everything he did for us, even the spankings or
switchings. If he hadn??™t loved us, he wouldn??™t have cared
what we did or if we got hurt.
So, I celebrate
my Father for what he was, good, bad or indifferent, he was
my Daddy and I loved him and still do and I miss not having
a father all the years of growing up and now too. Fathers
are the backbone of a family along with mothers. God help
fathers and mothers to give a lot of love and attention to
their children as well as good old fashioned discipline.
?© 2005 Nell Berry
Bio.: Nell Berry
is a newly published author of ???Growing Up In Missouri and
Other Short Stories. She loves to write song lyrics and
poetry. She is a grandmother and a great grandmother and she
loves to go to church and sing in the choir as well as a
solo once in awhile. She and her husband, Lou have been
married fifty-five years June the 24th. |
