BOHICA! Father's Day Again

BOHICA is Navy Speak for "Bend Over, Here It Comes Again!" What do you do for your da on Father's Day when you've already given him too many ties, cans of talcum powder, omaha steaks packed in dry ice, and attachments to the KitchenAid Mixer that one's brother hocked for more pot, all over the span of almost 60 years? My first and always hero is my da. He doesn't drink anymore (not since 1984), but, he can still be a stinker sometimes! Perhaps being hard-headed, stubborn, independent, and an occasional chooch, are just parts of the charms of the Ole Ulster Man makeup, eh? My da is quite a fella: Six-foot-2 and so skinny if he stood sideways and stuck his tongue out, he'd look like a zipper. And, those big blue eyes and medium brown hair, thick enough for five people. He's bald and much mellower now; James will be 82 this coming August of 2008; he beat prostate cancer once, but, now it's back.

My mum and da were married for fifty-five years, but this article is not supposed to be about the two of them or my mum, really; it's about Da -- it's just difficult for me to think of one without thinking of the other ... they were a pair who grew up together; salt and pepper, cream and coffee, etc.

Each season this ole farmer boy tended the fields, as he had done since he turned twelve years. He dropped out of school in his eighth grade due to necessity. He took his farming seriously, he had the best fields and crops in Gratiot County. I recall riding on the tractor seat between his legs as this farmer boy tended the fields. I was deposited at the front door of the house at 6:00 P.M. each evening for a bath and bedtime tuck-in by Mum and Da ... he would return to work the fields until 2:00 A.M. the next morning.

One day he rented a bulldozer and bought some dynamite for those bothersome tree stumps in his fields. He turned them to dust! Then many of the other farmers wanted to hire him and his rented bulldozer and dynamite to blow up their tree stumps.

It wasn't much later Da leased a truck and grain trailer to haul his fields' yields to the grain elevator in North Star. Other farmers in the area were ready to hire him to haul their fields' yields as well.

Due to the profitable success of hiring himself out to do the work of others, Da quit farming about 1957, leased the fields, and started hauling sweet crude for N & W Transport for Leonard Refineries (later Total Refineries) in Alma, Michigan. Three years later, he owned three off-the-road tractors (size of a small house) and he hauled sweet crude in a lead and a pup. He was on the road three and five days at a time, and, I missed him very much.

Three more years, he owned 10 units of his own. He hauled sweet crude for 3 states around. Three more years, he owned 120 units and hauled sweet crude for 5 states around. He never spent his money that he made, he just lived as humbly as he did when he was working in the fields on the farm, using Pat and Mike until he could afford a tractor.

Due to Da's success, we all moved uptown to Ithaca, Michigan, the seat of Gratiot County, population 1,200 as of 1960 and still is in 2008.

Da did go through a short period when he thought he was hot stuff due to his success, but, Mum took it upon herself to haul him back into reality. There were two running weeks when Da spent six nights in the bars with the boys. Mum was not pleased, and, she told him, "James, you may be a hot shot man now, but, you are a family man who has a wife and two children. You are a family man, like it or not, and it's past the time you behaved.

Da may have listened, but, he went out to the bars with the boys the next week anyhoo. To get his attention in one of her most famous ways, Mum washed all of his underwear with fiberglass curtains. Da experienced a three-week rash, the cause of which not even Dr. Brilhart or Dr. Williams could decipher. After those three weeks, Mum felt she had done her duty, and she threw all of Da's old underwear away and bought him new ones. Miraculously, the rash just disappeared.

In 1962, some Mick (Northern Irish Catholic) girlfriends and I started a club at my house. My house was perfect, as when Mum and Da purchased ole Dr. Kilborn's house at 218 North Pine River Street in Ithaca, there were a lot of spooky things left in the attic. I have no clue as to what purpose this club was for, but, the initiation was to sit on the floor in the attic for ten minutes. I was the last one to do the initiation process. When I came out, I asked, "Did anyone else hear a scratching noise?" Everyone else did hear the scratching noise. We investigated. There was a bat caught within three nesting copper tubs and we all freaked. I went down to the basement where Da slept in between crude hauls, woke him up, telling him he had to hurry and take care of the bat! He came up to the attic five minutes later, sprayed the bat with Engine Start (either), wrapped the dying and almost dead critter in his red calico hanky, and said to me, "Girl, have you washed all the windows inside and out downstairs and cleaned your room yet today? I'll take care of this, you need to get to work!" My selective hearing never heard the "get to work" thang, and all my friends were so impressed with Da's taking care of the bat!

Da was going to teach me how ride a horse one day. I was raised around horses and big dogs. From the time I can remember, there was Pat and Mike -- the two Clydes that worked the fields until Da got his first fuel-powered tractor. Da would put me on Pat's or Mike's back when I was about seven years, and the bottoms of my feet didn't even hang past their whithers.

Later on, when I was on my way to growing up (26 years old), but never got there, I purchased four horses for riding pleasure: Morgan mare and stubborn sow, former barrel racer whose favorite game was "who can kill who first?", the one who taught me how to ride; Purebred Arab who was gelded when he was six, but still thought he was a stud at twelve; Rocking horse quarter horse trained to cut and could stop on a dime ... sail you over his head spread-eagle on the road if you didn't have your toukas firm in the seat and weren't ready for a stop you asked for; Half-Arab/Half-Tennessee Walker who stood 18 hands, was afraid of her own shadow, and would kick you out of her stall if your voice was too loud. (Doesn't matter the breed of the horse, you go by the eyes ... if you see no white, you must earn their respect; if you see white, you must earn their confidence.)

Sadie, the Morgan mare, no one ever saw the whites of her eyes, had a tough mouth, so, her bit was an eight-inch cheek stem cowboy snaffle (gouged the roof of her mouth with a nutcracker effect if she didn't behave). I rode Sadie, who never showed the white, back to the house for a week's end, and Da said, "So, you wanna learn how to ride? I'll show ya how ya ride a freakin' horse!" (Da was still drinking then.) Da got on Sadie's back, he took the reins, and, Sadie took him for a ride ... under each of seven trees in the back yard ... each one progressively lower, until Da hit the ground on his left shoulder and dropped and spilled his can of beer. Da jumped up quickly on his feet and said, "So, Girl! You must always let the horse know you are the boss, the one in charge, and, that is how it is done!"

And, then, after almost seven years of being divorced from a Good Ole Navy Boy, there is that time I married a Good Ole Boy From Houston, Texas who wasn't. The marriage only lasted for four months. I moved all the way to Lake Jackson, Texas for that, however, I did very much enjoy Bryan Beach and Galveston. I had sold all my corporate stock and invested in CD's and didn't have to work anymore ... not bad back then at the age of forty-one. Problem was, Good Ole Houston boy who was a master chemist at Dow didn't like my doing nothing and bringing in more money in one week than he did in one month, even though I was paying all the bills. Behind my back, he phoned my da for advice as to how to handle me. Da told him, "I haven't been able to control her since she was two years old, what makes you think you are so special?" Ten minutes later, I get a phone call from Da, "Comin' to get you, Girl, get your grip in order, you're coming home now!"

Every time Mum had a health problem, Da was the one to call and ask, "Nancee Jo, your mother has just had a stroke. I don't know what to do. Can you come and help me, please?", or, "Nancee Jo, your mother has just suffered a very large heart attack. I don't know what to do. Can you come and help me, please?" I always went and did, because, he was always there for me. (Mum suffered two massive strokes, five major heart attacks, two bunionectomies, two cornea transplants, Da was always there, he never left.) The last time Da asked me for help with Mum was 11:00 on a Sunday night, March 19, 2000. He knocked on my bedroom door, "Nancee Jo, something is wrong with your mother, will you come help me, please?" I crawled on my mum's bed to see what was the matter. Her eyes were cloudy and she was barely warm. I told Da, "She's gone, Da. She's at peace now. She's gone." Da said, "What will I do?" I answered, "For starters, you need to put some clothes on right now, because, I'm calling 911 and you don't want the EMS and ladder truck guys to see you in just your underwear, you look like Humpty Dumpty! It'll be okay, we knew it was coming, she got her wish to die in her own home in her own bed. Not many have that wish fulfilled. Go get your clothes on!"

Shortly after that, I saw my da go through forty-two treatments of external beam radiation therapy for his prostate cancer. And, a few minor things in comparison.

Da has never been in debt, he always paid cash, even for each of the six homes and numerous Lincoln Town Cars and Marks he purchased. (Can you imagine? Going in to purchase a new car and how big the salesman's eyes grow when one says, "Save your time and mine, don't need financing, paying cash. What discount are you going to give me? Make it a good one, you are not the only rooster in the henhouse.)

Da is in Tucson now, he has remarried, and, oh, how I miss him!

Happy Father's Day, Da, My First and Always Hero! You are, and, always will be tucked under the biggest part of my heart.

I will love you, Da, until Cromwell is released from hell.

~ Nan