Comparing a Father and Son
June 19, 2011
I poured a quart of Epsom salt into a stream of hot water. It was a rough week of training, and I needed to soak in a hot bath. Grief overwhelmed me, and I began crying.
Some people wiser than I appreciated their fathers from an early age. Although I've always loved and been grateful to him, fatherhood didn't make sense until my 30's.
My life is hedonistic and self-indulgent. I don't own a home, and never want to. Other than student loans and a dog, I have no obligations. If times get tough, I can stay with friends and live a piker's existence.
When I jump into a hot bath, it's because my muscles are sore from lifting weights, which I do mainly because I'm vain. When my dad took the same Epsom salt baths, it was because his body was beaten down from eight-dollar-an-hour factory jobs.
When my dad was my age, he had four children and a wife to support. What must it have been like, waking up every day, knowing others depended on you?
What was it like knowing you had never-ending obligations. Four kids and a wife to support? What kind of pressure was that?
When he was just a couple of years older than I am, he applied for a state police job. A friend within the force told him he didn't get the job because of affirmative action - and this was confirmed years later, as the state police settled a class action reverse discrimination lawsuit.
What must it have felt like to work hard and be cheated? How does one continue on? Again, he had no choice. He continued grinding out in factories.
Well, that's a lie. He did have a choice. He could have left his family. He could have sought some "me time." Instead, he kept answering the far-too-early morning's alarm clock.
When you're poor, ordering pizza is a big deal. Every Friday night was pizza night. I used to argue with my dad, as he liked taco pizza. I preferred Meat Lover's, and he'd sometimes let me win.
During junior high, I took a part-time job cleaning the offices of the factory where my dad worked. My grandmother took me on a tour of the factory floor. After I saw his working conditions - sooty, with iron clanging and people screaming, I never argued with him again.
When you live in a poor area, there aren't many jobs. You work in a factory or you take a city job. When my dad was 35, he applied for a job with the city police force.
He studied the police question-and-answer books. He set goals, lost 30 pounds, and go into fantastic shape. He was prepared for the test.
His hard work paid off. He had the highest test scores, and thus was guaranteed a job. His family's standard of living would have been twice as high, and he would have gotten out of the factories.
My dad must have felt so proud. He worked hard. No one did him any favors. He earned his job. He did everything right. He played by the rules. Or so he thought.
Then someone read that although my dad wasn't too old to be offered the job, he was too old to have applied for it in the first place. The police thus went to disqualify him, and the issue came before the police commission.
My grandfather was on the police commission, and abstained from fighting for my father. He said nothing. Was my dad's dad more worried about preserving relationships with the local psuedo-aristocracy than fighting for his son? What must it have felt like to not have your own father defend you?
My dad's disappointments would have sent me into a self-destructive rage. My dad fought on. He never abandoned his family. He never took any vaction days. He worked up at 4:30 a.m. to begin his 5:15 a.m. shift. He abused his body for us.
While I can't identify with my dad, I can compare myself to him, and realize what a horrible person I am - and what a great person he is. I'm basically a narcissistic piece of shit, and the world needs less men like me and more like my dad.
Thankfully for my brothers, sister, and mother, we had my dad. Thankfully there are still a few men like him in this world.
Happy Father's Day.