August 9, 2021 – I Remember When – “Memories of My Dad!”

         I looked forward to Dad coming home when I was a child. Life is filled with desires and ‘look-forward-to’s’.

Now I know that desire is the sense of belonging to someone who gives me joy!

I enjoyed the great meals and the wisdom of my Mother, who still teaches me in my memories. As a teenager, my parents embarrassed me.  While swimming at the Roman Nose Park Swimming Pool, I saw my parents strolling up to watch me.  The life guard asked, “Do your parents always hold hands like that?”

My Dad taught me the joy of laughter and faith in God with a zest for living.  His hugs, his story-telling, and making friends made me look forward to seeing him come home.

Except that one time when Mother tried to punish me, but I wriggled from her grasp. She said, “I’ll just wait until your Dad comes home and he will spank you!” I cried and went to the bathroom. I took the razor strap hanging there Dad used when we disobeyed and proceeded to spend the afternoon spanking myself, wailing at the top of my lungs. I can’t recall that he carried him carrying out the dreaded punishment.

Adding and subtracting were one of life’s mysteries to me. One evening my Dad, a former teacher, tried to explain as he rested in the white rocking chair. The book rocked with him, so I decided it was prudent to stand on the rungs so I could see the book easier. His hand flew up and caught the string of beads I was wearing.  I was heart-broken, the beads were beautiful, and cost a whole penny at the store across the street from school.

This did not erase my love for my Dad.  One summer day, as he came by in the Parcel Post Truck, he asked if I wanted to go with him.  I remember the joy of sitting on the running board and watching as he delivered packages, signing his name over and over, and laughing with his friends. It amazed me he knew so many people. This, then was my Dad’s world.

This I knew about Dad.  He loved my Mom, I knew he wanted to do what was right in the eyes of God. His singing was usually a little off key, and yet no one could deny that he had the gift of praising God with His whole heart.

He taught a class of boys in Sunday School.  No matter how exhausted he was, he was always ready to practice the Bible Story on us. His face told the story, too, as the climax came, his eyes grew large and his voice softer.  Then his voice boomed when “Abraham raised the knife, ready to plunge it into the hear of his only son Isaac!  Just then the angel stopped the descent of the knife, and Isaac’s life was spared.”

Our family began a new tradition. A Family Pow-Wow.  Jim made popcorn, Gene made lemonade, and I made fudge for our time in the backyard discussing Family Business.  We ‘made do’ a lot, and ‘pinched’ pennies.  We wore homemade dresses and shirts made from feed sack cloth. Mother embroidered flowers over any holes that appeared or placed pockets over the holes when she sewed our many dresses and shirts.

I was born in the Depression Year of 1929.  1940 was not far from it and mailmen don’t make very much money.  The business at hand this night under the stars? Could Dad have a nickel to buy a coke when he delivered mail at the hospital, on his route? We carefully considered it. Dad walked 20 miles each day in all kinds of weather.  We loved our Dad and we voted yes.

Dad learned to half-sole his shoes to make them last longer. Yes, we made-do with prayers and laughter.

During the World War II, the mail continued to go through. Rationing of sugar, and butter began.  We were thankful for our cow, chickens and the many jars of vegetables and fruit we helped Mom can. Our family pow-wows came to an end, as we all began high school, and could no longer make fudge. Dad came home with several cans of Hershey chocolate syrup a mail patron had given.  Dad planted sugar cane in the garden.  We carried the sweet stalks to the swimming pool for our ‘candy bars’.  Mom twisted the stalks and sent them through the Maytag Washer wringers…to harvest the syrup. She boiled down the jars of syrup and stored in sealed jars.  One night I heard a loud explosion, and a jar of home-grown sugar cane syrup was gone.

When my Dad died in 1979, it was very difficult for me to accept.  I needed my Dad.  That is when I realized that our Father in Heaven is truly my Father.

Even as I felt secure with my Dad, I know I am eternally secure belonging to my Heavenly Father.  It is through Jesus Christ, I will be reunited with my earthly Dad because of my Heavenly Father’s steadfast love.

See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know Him.  Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when He appears we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is. And everyone who thus hopes in Him purifies himself as He is pure. I John 3:1-3.

         I still look forward most of all in going Home to see my Father God, Who cares for my loved ones who love Jesus and gone before me.