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  #46  
Old 09-22-2017, 12:19 PM
Photojeep Photojeep is offline
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Like most typical boys, I first idolized my Dad then as a teenager hated him. Of course when I became an adult and a father, I realized what a stupid person I was for hating him when I was a teenager. I lost him January 31, 2016 and all at once the memories came flooding in.

My Dad was the guy who could fix just about anything. He was a 30 year career Navy man and I imagine learned most of his fixing skills there.

If I had to list the most important lesson I learned from him would to be as helpful as I can to anyone who needs help.

I remember when I was around 8 of 9 years old we were driving home late at night when my Dad pulled the car over to the side of the road. Being in the days before seatbelts, my favorite spot in the station wagon was in the far back open area. I didn’t initially see that he pulled over to help someone change a flat tire.

When he got back in the car I asked him if the guy he’d just helped was a friend and he answered, “Not before tonight.” After that time, I noticed he would always stop to help strangers and friends alike. When he wasn’t working onboard ship, he was building something for someone or fixing a leaky faucet for a neighbor or something else for someone. Up until the day he died he would always buy extra food at the Commissary to give to his neighbors, many of whom were living on fixed incomes.

He would always play the Illinois lottery and once when I asked him what he’d do with the money if he won he said that after he gave us kids some of it, he was going to go to the Appalachian mountains and spend the rest helping the poor people there. As far as I know he’d never even been there but knowing him he probably saw a tv show about the plight of the backwoods people living there and figured they could use the help.

To this day, I can’t pass by someone who’s struggling with something without offering to help. It’s just part of my DNA and I know it came from him.

I still miss him.

Best,
PJ
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  #47  
Old 09-22-2017, 12:32 PM
rlb9682 rlb9682 is offline
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Originally Posted by KevWind View Post
That is actually fortunate for you, but was not the case in my life, my father was in the house and our lives until at 14 years old my older brother and I physically threw him out of the house It was one night after a particularly ugly drunken, knock down drag out screaming match from 2:00 to 4:00 o'clock in the morning. Just the last straw of many episodes .
I did continue to have periodic contact with him throughout most of the rest of his life. Even though there were some good times and for the first 10 to 12 years of my life he tried to be a good family man. But try as he might he could never really overcome the tendency to resort to being a classic narcissist , who especially as he grew older acted as if at it's core family was there to service his physiological neuroses , ends, needs, and wants. All of which was very enlightening in learning how not to be .

He managed to burn through three failed marriages and a few live in girlfriends and end up alone.
He was one of those supposed "reformed" alcoholics who decided that by quitting drinking and joining some mongrelized back slapping support group. He had solved all his issues and any problems that came out of the rest of his selfish behaviors and thoughtless verbal tirades were everybody else's fault and problem. But he never really changed his fundamental perspective or behaviors. I finally decided to cut any contact entirely from my life in the last year and 1/2 of his life and ultimately that proved to be a very good thing.
So in retrospect his mistakes taught some valuable lessons about what not to do an allowed for a more productive path in my life. I honestly have no lost love and definitely no regrets .

So here is thought arising from the vast variation of replies in this thread -- Hollywood is not near clever enough to make this kind of stuff up out of shear imagination
Yeah, there are some things that just never get resolved. Your dad sounds like my mother, unfortunately with alcohol behavior, etc. As an adult I severely limited the times I saw her or spent with her. It was just too toxic otherwise.

She died suddenly about 11 years ago and I'm sorry to say this, but it was a relief to just about everyone. I not trying to sound petty or mean, but she was the type of person to burn through people and relationships, and small doses was the only way I could stand to deal with her.

And I agree, sometimes we learn a lot of lessons by NOT being how our parents were, I know that was the case with my mother.

I wish I could say we all had wonderful loving parents but that's just not how the world works, sadly. We can just do our best and adjust as needed. At the end of the day we're all flawed in one way or another.
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  #48  
Old 09-22-2017, 12:51 PM
Nyghthawk Nyghthawk is offline
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Originally Posted by Photojeep View Post
Like most typical boys, I first idolized my Dad then as a teenager hated him. Of course when I became an adult and a father, I realized what a stupid person I was for hating him when I was a teenager. I lost him January 31, 2016 and all at once the memories came flooding in.

My Dad was the guy who could fix just about anything. He was a 30 year career Navy man and I imagine learned most of his fixing skills there.

If I had to list the most important lesson I learned from him would to be as helpful as I can to anyone who needs help.

I remember when I was around 8 of 9 years old we were driving home late at night when my Dad pulled the car over to the side of the road. Being in the days before seatbelts, my favorite spot in the station wagon was in the far back open area. I didn’t initially see that he pulled over to help someone change a flat tire.

When he got back in the car I asked him if the guy he’d just helped was a friend and he answered, “Not before tonight.” After that time, I noticed he would always stop to help strangers and friends alike. When he wasn’t working onboard ship, he was building something for someone or fixing a leaky faucet for a neighbor or something else for someone. Up until the day he died he would always buy extra food at the Commissary to give to his neighbors, many of whom were living on fixed incomes.

He would always play the Illinois lottery and once when I asked him what he’d do with the money if he won he said that after he gave us kids some of it, he was going to go to the Appalachian mountains and spend the rest helping the poor people there. As far as I know he’d never even been there but knowing him he probably saw a tv show about the plight of the backwoods people living there and figured they could use the help.

To this day, I can’t pass by someone who’s struggling with something without offering to help. It’s just part of my DNA and I know it came from him.

I still miss him.

Best,
PJ
Thanks, PJ. I needed a story like that today!
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  #49  
Old 09-22-2017, 07:47 PM
Otterhound Otterhound is offline
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I arrived at the house unknowing of what was taking place .
My dad was on a gurney and the ambulance crew were wheeling him out the door when he made them stop .
He saw me .
As soon as he had completed his remark , he had them wheel him out without responding .
Last words were " I'm ashamed of you . " They were spoken with conviction and so that all would hear . I figured that he somehow knew that they would be his last words to me .
Just before he was to be released from the hospital , he fell dead from a massive heart attack .
I was not contacted , but learned of this from a third party at my sister's place of employment when I stopped by to eat lunch .
Ironically , his last words were mild in comparison .
I do not miss him , but I have wondered what could have been .
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  #50  
Old 09-23-2017, 08:12 AM
Truckjohn Truckjohn is offline
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I am blessed to have been born into a good family... I know others aren't nearly so lucky.... Many of them make an intentional effort to be better people because of what they grew up with.

I really feel for my brother in law.. An absolutely fantastic guy who had to deal with truly horrible parents... Both of them were/are horrible....

Just to give you a flavor with 2 anecdotes...
Father: When he was growing up - his father and uncles would fight their boys against eachother for weekend/holiday entertainment. The men would get drunk and bet money on which of their kids would beat the other up.. This wasn't play fighting.. This was blood sport... The boy who didn't win got another, even more terrible beating from his father because he lost money....

Mother: The sort of woman who would scream and yell and carry endlessly about nothing to intentionally provoke the drunk/violent father and then wonder why she got hit. Narcissistic and blamed him (the son) for all the family's problems.... His typical "birthday" party consisted of his mom blaming him for being born and then leaving him at home to go out to dinner without him. Even when he got older... His wife was in the hospital on the edge of death - and his mom comes over to complain constantly and get in the way of the doctors and everyone else. Then complains about how she wants this and that and he isn't doing enough for her (his mom).... All the while Sitting right there next to his wife on life support in the ICU..

His life's dream was just to move away and leave them all behind...

The moral is.. Often we don't see the blessings we receive. They are transparent to us..
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  #51  
Old 09-23-2017, 10:51 AM
Photojeep Photojeep is offline
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Originally Posted by Nyghthawk View Post
Thanks, PJ. I needed a story like that today!
My pleasure. He was always looking out for other people. He was no saint, but he was always looking out for others.

Best,
PJ
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