Fathers Appreciation-What Has Pops Meant to You?
Big_Stacks
"I don't worry about hittin' power, cause I don't give 'em nuttin' to hit." 4,670 Posts
Hey,First of all, I wish a Happy Father's Day to all those REAL fathers out there. Those dudes that love their families in words and deeds. The REAL MEN that hug their wives and kids, put food on the table, and go to work everyday. The men that spend time with their families, teach their children, fulfill their wife's needs (emotionally and otherwise), and put the needs of their families above their own.In recognition of those attributes, I wanna take this opportunity to acknowledge my father. First of all, I must say that my father has always been there for me. Through God, my father has given me so many wonderful gifts. Most importantly, he planted the seed to give me life. He didn't stop there though. My dad also introduced me to the gift of music, which has been a source of enjoyment, passion, pleasure, and solace for my entire life. He taught me how to play drums, which was a big contributor to my self-esteem as a child and adolescent. He also gave me the gift of his time and attention. Even though he worked hard in the military everyday, he was never too busy to spend time with his children, helping us with our homework, playing basketball, catch, fishing, taking us riding in the car, etc. In addition, my father gave, and continues to give, me the benefit of his wisdom. The man has advised me on how to live my life to the benefit of those around me, in addition to myself. Here are some of his many rhetorical questions that blew my mind as a teenager (when I was fucking up): "What are you going to do with your life, son? Are you gonna contribute positively to mankind, or just consume and die? What will people say about you after you're gone? What will be your legacy?" My dad never tolerated disrespect or laxity, and held me to standard of excellence from day one. He taught me principles like loving others as I love myself, spirituality, hard work, self-reliance, integrity, dignity, intellectuality, empathy, delayed gratification, frugality, respect for women, contribution to mankind, and the importance of legacy. He always stood by me even in the times of trouble, never judging, but lending a hand to improve my conditions. I just wanna give thanks to a man who raised me to become a man, and he was major part of what I've become. I love you, Dad!!! Let's give those REAL FATHERS some love!!!Peace,Big Stacks from Kakalak
Comments
http://www.soulstrut.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=888648&an=0&page=0#Post888648
This thread is a little different. Here, I invite cats to acknowledge what their fathers have meant to them, sort of like a tribute. OK, let's carry on, now. Let's see some props to those GOOD DADS out there!!!
Peace,
Big Stacks from Kakalak
I love my father.
Last year his father passed away so this Father's Day is extra special. Unfortunately, I have to work today/night so I can't spend time with him, but next week we(the fam) will be going out to Cali to visit my mother's father, who has parkinson's disease, so it will probably be the last time my mother sees her father. It makes me think about the day I will lose my father, and that bUMS me out something wicked. I wish we could get closer than we are, not that we have a shitty relationship, but we don't share many similar interests, so bonding doesnt happen often (unless I have a computer issue.) Alright now I'm depressed.
Love ya Dad.
My father. The smartest, most decent man I've ever known.
I haven't always been the best to him...the college years were tough to say the least. Drugs, alcohol, some trouble, and the man and I had a really tough time talking, and interacting on any real level. Through those years, I really think that the only thing that kept us talking at all was a shared interest in baseball. We couldn't talk about our problems with the way I was living, because we knew that would degenerate into another fight. But, we could talk about the Reds and the Sox, and that kept us going.
Until I was 22. Still a mess, I come home one morning, and I'll never forget it. He was mopping up his office downstairs, and had spent his morning dealing with a mess I'd made at work. 'Gar, your fucking up again,' he said as I walked in. And, then I just lost it... I was a crying mess, and he talked me off the ledge. After that, things between us got a lot better, a lot more honest, open, and caring. The man taught me a lot that morning- about life, confusion, fear, and that all those things are a normal state of being.
My father's father is a real prick; terse, cold, unemotional. Somehow, my old man is one of the kindest men on the planet. He has been a teacher his whole adult life, and I am proud to say that I have been his student- he has shared knowledge, a love of learning, a sense of adventure, and how to be loyal and do what is right. And, I thank him for his patience when I was a jerk, and his care when I came out of it.
1). My father along with my mother came to this country with nothing but a suitcase and I think a 100$ dollars and made it happen. I remember them telling me that they lived in a ratty little apart in the Tenderloin and he would have to shower using a salad bowl. He's always worked hard and has never complained no matter how tough times would get. Shit like that makes me feel like the biggest spoiled brat in the world. I'm damn proud that a man of color can come to this country and make it happen.
2). My brother passed away 9 years ago and while I become a self-destructive and depressed recluse, my father suffered in silence and was a rock to my mother who like any parent was devastated by our loss. Having to walk with that on your shoulders and stil go to work to bust your ass day in day out ....I can't even imagine how he could do it. And top it all off, he's stayed strong all these years and able to keep his hilarious wisecracking chops up!
My senior year of High School we had "Cut Day" where all the seniors would take the day off and party. My friends and I filled coolers with beer and headed out to the beach for the day. As we passed our school the parking lot was filled with kids and cars, drinking beer and letting off steam. As we slowed down I saw my dad, beer in hand, just hanging out with some of the kids from the neighborhood.
He was the only dad I knew that would have done this.
He worked hard and pursued his American Dream.
He was from a blue collar family of first generation immigrants.
He was a Union electrician in NYC and had a working mans hands, calloused and hard.
He was strict but in a reasonable way.
Harassed me about my hair and clothes but let most of it slide.
At 16 I was being a wise-ass punk and he took me to the garage, closed the door, and proclaimed that only one of us would be leaving.
He dared me to hit him, one free shot.
When I refused(out of total fear) he took a shot at me, I swung back and we went in the house to have a beer.
We never had a cross word again after that.
I spoke to him this afternoon. For Father's Day I wanted to write an article about my Dad and his hobby of 60 years, flying pigeons.
I hope to have it published in a magazine he subscribes to.
Everything I have or am today is because of him and my Mom.
I'm a very lucky person.
Happy Father's Day Dad!
He passed 13 years ago from cancer but in life he loomed large on my daily horizon. In death he is a beacon of integrity and hope. Like Stacks my dad was a true hero to me. He was a man in every sense of the word. He loved his kids to death, never missed a single game or swim meet, taught us all to respect ourselves and others and most importantly, gave us a tremendous example of how to be loving a mate. All my friends loved my dad because he spent the time to get to know them as individuals.
When I was 16 and kinda lost in the high school party scene, he was able to break through the haze. I was playing him some reggae I really loved and he just turned to me and asked, "Besides music, what are you about?". I was at a loss for words. He meant in a loving way but it hurt to know that I was disappointing him with my shallow ways. I quickly got my act together.
His love of music made a deep impression on me. When I was 16, he took me to see Taj Mahal. Ordered me a beer and sang along to every song. He was that kind of guy. When he was dying, we went to see Neil Young play an acoustic set. Right in the middle of the Needle and The Damage Done I heard this blood curdling rebel yell next to me. Of course, it was my dad was straight shooting tequila with the biker dudes sitting next to us. For my dad, life was all about showing people how much you loved them and showing them what he loved.
Rest in peace Dad.
Love and respect always,
Jason
You have communicated some beautiful sentiments and respect for your fathers. Dr. Wu, my condolences for the loss of your father. I think about that, sometimes, and I don't know how I could cope. I will probably be inconsolable. My dad looms like a giant in my life (to coin your very well-put phrase), and I've always been very close to him. Mom, for me, is another matter (but I love her too). There are only a few posts here thus far. Any other REAL FATHERS out there that deserve props? I think I may copy my post and email it to dad to express to him my gratitude for all he's done.
Peace,
Big Stacks from Kakalak
And every once in a while he'll ask me if I'm taking care of them.
William Klein, I love you and will always appreciate what you've done for me
he taught me to always be mindful of less fortunate in every situation and got me to instinctively always root for the underdogs (which was usually a philly team anyway).
i remember going to see a film with him about the spanish civil war and the lincoln brigades, a historical period which influenced his young life. i noticed him crying during one part of the film and it made me so proud for some reason. this guy was from a hardscrabble grapes of wrath type background and always associated with other people going through hard times and injustice. i remember him forcing me to watch Eyes on the Prize in its entirety when i was ten years old. only appreciated years later.
anyway...right now, we are finally working together, rehabbing an old shell of a house. i can bring some of my idealism to the project and he is teaching me his lifetime of expertise. hopefully the end results will be something notable, but regardless, i am cherishing the time spent together.
peace to all dads,
t
i have never won an argument with my father, even when he was wrong...if that makes sense. works and/or reads around the clock but doesn't consider anything to be work and sleeps about 3 hours a night. the guy is addicted to knowledge. great role model, but it is impossible for me to fill his shoes.
spent fathers day playing hoops with him and some other guys in their 50s and 60s. i felt like lebron james.
I really appreciate these stories. I have a few Daddy highlights, that demonstrate his "tough love" and how cool he could be, sometimes in rather fucked-up situations.
1. "N****a please."
-Pops had been bugging me forever about getting extra keys made for my car. I had been putting it off, thinking it was no big deal. Anyway, I was up at the gym on post hoopin', and somehow my keys were either taken or got misplaced. I looked around the gym forever for my keys, to no avail. The gym finally closed, and it started to rain and storm. I called Dad on the pay phone to come pick me up, only to hear his reply, and I quote, "N****a please," and he hung up. I called my mom at work, who ended up bailing me out, but the lesson was well-learned, always be prepared. He later explained he was upset, because if I had an extra key, all he had to do is bring it out to me. But, because of my disobedience, I had to suffer the consequences.
2. "Have you been drinking?"
-I was partying hard one night over on Murchison Road. I went to this hole-in-the-wall dive, and was throwin' 'em back. I started with a couple of 40oz. of 'Ole Gold. Then, I met up with one of my dudes from Westover High (we had graduated a few years ago, at this time), and he hooked me up with a small flask of Long Island Ice Tea Mix. By this point, I was faded. I gave dude a pound, and went to my ride....and that is the last thing I remember.
Fast-forward, I am awakened to "Born to Get Busy" by Cypress Hill in the tape deck of my Escort. I remember that like yesterday, because it was the day I bought the "S/T" joint. I noticed my chest was hurting. Anyway, I stumble out the car, only to realize I've wrecked my shit into a construction site, sitting in pile of dirt, just feet away from a 10ft. dropoff to a concrete water main (that spot still has my ass "shook" when I drive over it during my visits to Fayetteville). So, I stumble past all this construction shit, go to a gas station, and I call pops on the pay phone. A few minutes later, he comes to pick me up. He parks a few feet away (Daddy's intuition), to make my drunk-ass stumble to the ride. "Have you been drinkin'?," he asks. "Nah, nah," I reply but he knew (and smelled) otherwise. He never riffed on me, just took me back out to the crash site the next day, and pulled my ride to the crib. In addition, he never gave me shit about the incident, knowing I learned a lesson from it. Dad was cool like that. Now Mom, however, gave me shit about it (and still does, on occasion).
3. "You dropped a whole semester worth of credits?"
-This was a tense time at the crib. I was an undergraduate at Fayetteville State, around 1989, fucking up like a muthafucka, academically. I was basically blowin' off class, and kickin' it almost every night. So, I knew my grades would be in the toilet, so I had the bright idea of droppin' ALL of my classes. Now, hard-working William, scrimped and saved and paid the tuition every semester for his (at the time) dumb-ass, spoiled, ingrate son. I didn't tell Pops what I had done, but it was around May, which meant time to "check in" those semester grades to "The Don." I didn't have any to check in. He asked what was up, and I told him what I had done. He asked, "You dropped a whole semester worth of credits?" I said "Yes," to his reply, "You threw away nearly $1,000.00 doing that. You're through going to school on my hard-earned money. If you go back, you'll pay for it yourself." Now, while I was pissed as hell (and had an "attitude" toward him for months), during that year hiatus from Fayetteville State, I did the roughest, most back-breaking work I had ever done in life, and learned what a privilege it was to go to college. Around Spring of 1990, I asked him for another shot, saying I wouldn't mess it up this time. He said, "OK," and as they say, the rest is history. I went on to earn 4.0 GPAs for my last three years of college, won Departmental academic awards, was named to the National Dean's List from 1990-1993, and earned an Assistantship to attend the doctoral program at the University of Akron. It's amazing what a big kick in the ass, from big William, can accomplish.
4. "I thought you might need a few bucks..."
-Dad was mad frugal with the loot as long as I've known him (since 1969). He could pinch a quarter and make $5.00 out of it. While I was in grad school, Dad would look out on the low. At the end of my visit home, I had given my hugs, said goodbye, received Mom's bucket of freshly-fried chicken and loaf of Merita bread, and was off to the Amoco station near my parents' crib to gas up for the long trip to Akron (OH). I started pumpin' the gas, only to see Pops pulling up in his pick-up truck. He comes up to me and says, "I thought you might need a few bucks for groceries," and broke me off $100.00. He gave me a hug and a pound, and drove back to the crib. That kind a shit just fucked me up, because it showed sides of Dad I didn't know existed.
I'll stop there, but William is my dude, and always will be. Love you, Dad!!!
Peace,
Big Stacks from Kakalak
2. He kept his alduterous ways on the low until I was an adult and could express my anger at him.
3. He is the guy who my friends ask about after they meet him... he is way cooler than me.
4. I almost lost him this year as he had one on those blood clots in his leg. He is okay now.
5. He retired two weeks ago and I'm scared because you know how they say when people retire they die soon after.
6. I cant for the life of me see how he and my mom got together long enough to make me... they have nothing in common other than being attractive people but that all it takes I guess.
7. Dude is really just too fly to even get into in this small forum.
I've been sleepless since Father's Day. One of my oldest friends, who was just out here to be a
groomsmenMember of the Men's Rowing Team at my wedding, got home from my wedding to learn that his dad killed himself. Smothered himself with a bag over his head in a hotel room. It breaks my heart. My friend, someone I've leaned on in the more desparate moments in my life, is the kind of person you can lean on specifically because of his father. Not that his father taught him these things, but exactly the opposite. His dad was largely uninterested in the lives of his children.In high school we used to hang out at his house. His dad and step mom were pretty well off (well, better than the rest of us), so his house had air conditioning and food and a stereo, which was cool to us. In all the time I spent there (thousands of hours, I'm sure), I have a handful of memories of seeing his father show even the slightest interest in anything related to his son.
It's hard to quantify what kind of extra baggage this upbringing has on a son. It's easier, though, than trying to reconcile the grief and guilt when that life, a life that was never really interested in you, is suddenly gone, with no answers. Burying your father is hard. Burying a perfect stranger makes it complicated in ways that a son shouldn't have to comprehend.
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I owe so much to my father. Not for teaching me anything, or loving me, or being a part of my life, but for the opposite. I can't remember the last Father's Day that I 'celebrated' with my dad. He left us when I was very young. He told my mom, when she asked why he didn't want to see his own kids, "I don't have any kids." This was put into practice 25 years later, when I met his 4th (5th?) wife quite by accident, and introduced myself as his son. She looked dumbfounded from me to my dad, and started, "I thought you didn't have any ki-" before she realized what an awful thing it would be for a child to hear. No matter, it wasn't the first time it happened.
I worked for my father, briefly, in the '90s, during a period of reconciliation that I initiated. I had wanted to know him for myself, rather than knowing the memories, the absolutely awful stories, my family had told me. My dad owned a welding shop, and he asked me to come work for him. My tenure began with me making $7/hour, he said he'd train me to be a welder, a vocation that would sustain me for a lifetime. He promised to get me certified, and said that I'd be comfortable, good welders can make $50/hr. I learned everything, and in no time was doing most of the fabrication in the shop. Guys would come in, yell my dad's name at me, and after I stopped working and took my welding mask off, they'd say, "Where's Jim?" I'd tell them he was out. They'd ask me who I was. I'd say, "I'm his son." They'd look at me, squint their eyes, then tell me, "Naw, Jim ain't got no kids. Who are you, really?"
After two year I was still making $7/hr. Each Friday, my dad would ask me how many hours I worked. I'd tell him. He'd ask me how much money I was owed. I'd multiply my hours worked by 7, then tell him. He's shake his head, scoff at me, then take cash out of his wallet, throw it on the floor of the shop and say, "you're not worth half that much!" and walk out. After a while I just quit coming to work, realizing my uncles who had told me my dad was a motherfucker were right.
Being beaten, neglected, ridiculed, heckled and ignored by your own father is the sort of thing that takes a lifetime to recover from. Most of my friends, who found themselves in similar situations, haven't been as fortunate as me. Four of them committed suicide. Others are in prison, or in various states of mental disassociation, often strung out.
My dad called me after years of silence, on my birthday of all days. After I answered and heard his voice ("hey, what's going on?") feign normality, I instantly got shaky in only the way someone who has disrupted your life in so many ways can make you shaky, and wondered how he knew it was me birthday. I can't remember my father ever wishing my happy birthday. Turns out it was just a coincidence. He had no idea. He was just calling to tell me he had just gotten out of rehab. He's a drunk, and his life has caught up with him. It was probably the most honest conversation I'd ever had with him. That is, it was the only time he's talked to me when I felt like he wasn't lying. He hung up, promising to call me again in three days after getting the results of the test regarding the lumps the doctors found on his lungs, to tell me if it was serious or not. He didn't ask about me. And he never called back.
I think about my best friend, and his dad suffocating himself, and wonder how long the guilt will eat at him. My friends and I--our group of hermits and miscreants, shaped largely by the misconduct of our fathers--sticks together pretty tight. In fact, some of the best fathering I have ever witnessed has been at the hands of my friends. Turns out, if you one can survive the punishments that this type of upbringing bears, one knows the stakes involved in raising a child of his own.
Bringing me along on his drug deals, letting his friends use me to satisfy their curiosities, and decades of silence, I still see him when I look at my own face. It's something that I have just recently become comfortable with.
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I have very few photographs of my father, and even fewer of my own memories of him. And while I can't think of one that is positive, I know what has taught me about tenderness, and true love, and taking care of those you care about.
I have no idea if my dad is alive. I wish him the best.
Assume that everything you do makes a difference.
I grew up around NYC in the posh suburb of Ridgefield, CT. It was the late 70s / early 80s and there was a lot of partying and adultery amongst my parents circle of friends. In 1982, My parents went through an ugly divorce when I was only 7. There was a lot of screaming and physical abuse. I spent a lot of time hiding in closets. After the divorce, I moved in with my mother and sisters in CT while my dad returned to Pittsburgh.
When I was 10, I chose to move to Pittsburgh to live with my father. The school systems were better than where my mom was moving to (the crack haven of Bridgeport, CT.)
In the late 80s, My dad started his own temp agency which failed miserably. He was broke and didn't pay the bills.. but he always seem to have enough $$ to buy cartons of cigarrettes and keep the fridge well stocked with Coors Light. He proceeded to numb his pain with alcohol and I continued to be a confused adolescent. His confidence depended on employment... and by the time I was 12, he started making money again as a stock broker.
He was then back in my life making sure I was signed up for sports and never missed a game. He taught me how to play guitar and always made sure I had spending cash.
Things were smooth until my Junior year college where he slipped into his old habits after switching firms and losing all his previous clients. He failed to tell me he had stopped paying my college tuition and rent and I was endangered of getting kicked out of school and evicted.
I was thoroughly pissed.
After years of harboring resentment and simply co-existing, it wasn't until he met his current wife and the birth of my children, that we decided to move on and improve our relationship. We opened the line of communication and he visits every couple of months. Lately he has been having some health problems that has been an incentive to move on from past resent and love him for who he is. I can now move on and focus on all the positives my father possess.
I love you dad!
You dissin' Bridgepuerto? Nah, I'm playing...BPT was gangster as hell back then. My pops worked at Bridgeport Hospital--a scary neighborhood by itself, to say nothing of PT Barnum. Yeesh.
Which segues nicely to my pops.
Like a lot of people did with their dads, I imagine, I butted heads with my dad a lot as a teenager. A whole lot. We spent most of my adolescence and even beyond arguing with each other or being highly passive-aggressive with each other. It was a pretty ugly scene all aorund.
Of course, it wasn't always like that. When I was younger, my dad and I got along great. He took me fishing a lot, which I loved back then, gave me my first fishing rod and tackle box, taught me how to tie and cast flies, the whole nine. I had a great time with him. And he also did a lot to break me out of the solipsism that kids have--that unintentional greed and selfishness. He taught me from an early age that unchecked greed is a bad thing and that you're supposed to help people, particularly those who aren't as lucky as you, because, well, that's what good people do.
Then he and my mom got divorced when I was 10, which triggered all sorts of messed-up family and personal issues, too numerous to get into. The thing was, my parents divorced completely because of my dad's alcoholism. And even when we were at each other's throats a ton in later years and I was so angry and resentful with him, I never lost respect for him for how he carried himself post-divorce regarding his drinking.
He could've just packed it in, you know? He could've blamed everybody else, he could've let himself go down the drain (alcoholic pancreatitis would've most certainly killed him).
But he didn't. He took complete responsibility for his drinking and the damage it caused, he blamed nobody but himself, and he realized that as bad as things were for him, they were fixable. So he quit drinking--and has been completely sober for more than 20 years now. After plowing through a fifth of gin almost on the daily, he just plain went cold turkey. I give him a lot of respect for doing that. I have a pretty touchy relationship with alcohol to this day because of what I saw it do to my dad. I think I could easily fall intot he alcoholism trap like he did, but I don't think that I'd be able to pull myself out of it like he did. That's some pretty amazing strength.
Now? My pops and I are very cool--a level I never would've thought attainable when I was 16, or even 20. We've both mellowed out, and we've found common ground with each other, which is pretty amazing. And he is all about me being a DJ (at first, he didn't like it at all and thought it was just a stupid, expensive hobby). He thinks the fact that I've put out records is the coolest shit in the world, and he's always asking if he can buy me new needles or headphones or what have you. I never would've thought that was possible. He doesn't really understand DJing, but he understands that I love it and can relate to that feeling. 10 years ago, I wouldn't have thought we could relate about anything.
It's been quite a road to get to where we are today, but I guess that's the way it has to be. And I'm glad things have turned out the way we have.