Today would’ve been my father’s 73rd birthday. Strange, really, to think about that number. Seventy-three seems so old, even as my mom turns 72 next month. But my mom does not look like she’s in her 70's. You see, while 73 is old, the more mind-numbing thing is he’ll be dead 39 years this July 19. How do you wrap your mind around this? How do you understand the concept of losing your own father to cancer at the age of 34?
To this day, I miss him. Which, I guess, I should. I also am very angry that the fates, God, or whatever you believe in, took him away from me, my siblings and my mother. Why, I would cry like Sally Field in Steel Magnolia, what did my mother or us kids do that forced the universe to take such bold move and remove my father from this earth?
But, then, there is no reason. It just is.
I have very little memory of him, which pains me more than even him not being here for that 73rd birthday. He died two months short of my sixth birthday. And from what I heard from my mother, I seemed to have fallen to pieces.
I have no memory of much of that time. I do see flashes of life after my dad’s death. I remember the funeral -I think it was a cloudy day. I remember some Christmases and bits of special occasions, like my communion, but most of that time, say from the time he died to the time my mom remarried in 1972 are gone.
I know from what my mother has told me, that I sort of came unglued. Hiding in closets when teachers left the classroom. I apparently did many other things that eventually forced my mom to put me in some special school for -what, if I remember correctly - developmentally handicapped people. I even took the yellow short bus to school.
Funny, while I don’t recall what I did there, I do know I hated it with a passion. And it put me behind a year in school, which lead to many self-esteem issues I still have today.
Anyways, in Back to the Future II after a brief trip from 1985 to 2015, Doc and Marty return to 1985, only to discover that the timeline has somehow changed. They eventually figure out that 2015 version of Biff had somehow returned to 1955 and given his younger self a sports book that had all the winning scores in them. Young Biff would eventually use that almanac to become very wealthy and that would alter the future.
As the Doc tries to explain to Marty what happens, he draws a line on a chalkboard, representing time as a straight line. Somewhere in 1955, Old Biff hands Young Biff the sports almanac. This event eventually skewers the timeline, creating an alternate version of 1985. Later, Marty discovers that the Old Biff visited Young Biff during the events of the first film. As Doc and Marty head back to 1955 (again), the Doc ponders that it was “Unbelievable, that old Biff could have chosen that particular date. It could mean that, that point in time inherently contains some sort of cosmic significance. Almost as if it were the junction point for the entire space-time continuum.”
1968 appeared to be another one of those “junction points”, if you ask me. So many things happened that year, so many historical things: Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy assassinated, the war in Vietnam further eroding and dividing a nation.
And while my dads death -in the grand historical notion - is nothing, there are plenty of what if’s that came out of that year. Could we be living in an altered timeline? Is there another version of 1968 that never lost its King or its Kennedy or, even, my father?
Quantum Mechanics teaches you the idea that there are infinite worlds, and in that theory, my Dad is alive.
There are not that many images of my dad that exist today. He had a fondness for taking photos and super 8 films, but somehow never ended up in the pictures of the film. A few years ago, I discovered a five minute or so role of film in my mom’s hall closet. I took that film to a place where I used to live in Forest Park. There they converted the 8 millimeter strip to a video tape.
When I got it back, I watched what was on it. What played across the screen, was a brief history of us kids. Summer time in the backyard, with my brother and sister playing in the plastic pool. My little sister, just learning to walk, the pond beyond our property. The scenes shift to me playing cars with my siblings, shifts back to a snow covered yard and then back to a gathering in my moms house. And it is here, in a flash of maybe a second or two, is my father. He looks at the camera, and smiles a bit (though, I wonder if its just the bright light that forces the smile). It’s the only “moving” picture that I think exists of him.
My mom has pictures of him before they got married and a few of him in uniform during the Korean War -though I’m not sure he ever served there. But that is all that remains of him.
I’ve tried to remember him, what his voice sounded like, but I have no physical memory of him. And to this day, I wonder what is real or what has been placed in my mind by my mother and my Uncle Harold, who seemed to have great admiration of him.
Its bizarre to think that 39 years has gone without him here. And I wonder, a lot now, what life we all would’ve lead had he not died on the July day in 1968. I know its silly, and ultimately pointless, but I still would like to see that version of my world.
Would my parents still been married (it would be 49 years this year)? Would we all been more successful in life, would I be living in California as I do now?
Would I still have been gay?
So many things, so much potential lost in the fog of history. And while I’m happy for my life now, and while I’m happy my mom has finally found a man who worships the ground she walks on and I love him dearly, I wish 1968 never happened.
I wish that I could travel back to July of that year (or even earlier, at the time he took up smoking) and prevented his death. Though, I now realize that the cancer that eventually killed him was not caused fully by the smoking.
I realize the foolishness of that first sentence, but it does not change my feelings. I know that had he not died, my life and life of my siblings would’ve been better. I cannot explain why I know this, but I do.
God has a lot to answer for, believe you me. He needs to explain to me why this happened, what great purpose it served for four kids to grow up without a father.
Happy Birthday, Dad.
I miss you!
To this day, I miss him. Which, I guess, I should. I also am very angry that the fates, God, or whatever you believe in, took him away from me, my siblings and my mother. Why, I would cry like Sally Field in Steel Magnolia, what did my mother or us kids do that forced the universe to take such bold move and remove my father from this earth?
But, then, there is no reason. It just is.
I have very little memory of him, which pains me more than even him not being here for that 73rd birthday. He died two months short of my sixth birthday. And from what I heard from my mother, I seemed to have fallen to pieces.
I have no memory of much of that time. I do see flashes of life after my dad’s death. I remember the funeral -I think it was a cloudy day. I remember some Christmases and bits of special occasions, like my communion, but most of that time, say from the time he died to the time my mom remarried in 1972 are gone.
I know from what my mother has told me, that I sort of came unglued. Hiding in closets when teachers left the classroom. I apparently did many other things that eventually forced my mom to put me in some special school for -what, if I remember correctly - developmentally handicapped people. I even took the yellow short bus to school.
Funny, while I don’t recall what I did there, I do know I hated it with a passion. And it put me behind a year in school, which lead to many self-esteem issues I still have today.
Anyways, in Back to the Future II after a brief trip from 1985 to 2015, Doc and Marty return to 1985, only to discover that the timeline has somehow changed. They eventually figure out that 2015 version of Biff had somehow returned to 1955 and given his younger self a sports book that had all the winning scores in them. Young Biff would eventually use that almanac to become very wealthy and that would alter the future.
As the Doc tries to explain to Marty what happens, he draws a line on a chalkboard, representing time as a straight line. Somewhere in 1955, Old Biff hands Young Biff the sports almanac. This event eventually skewers the timeline, creating an alternate version of 1985. Later, Marty discovers that the Old Biff visited Young Biff during the events of the first film. As Doc and Marty head back to 1955 (again), the Doc ponders that it was “Unbelievable, that old Biff could have chosen that particular date. It could mean that, that point in time inherently contains some sort of cosmic significance. Almost as if it were the junction point for the entire space-time continuum.”
1968 appeared to be another one of those “junction points”, if you ask me. So many things happened that year, so many historical things: Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy assassinated, the war in Vietnam further eroding and dividing a nation.
And while my dads death -in the grand historical notion - is nothing, there are plenty of what if’s that came out of that year. Could we be living in an altered timeline? Is there another version of 1968 that never lost its King or its Kennedy or, even, my father?
Quantum Mechanics teaches you the idea that there are infinite worlds, and in that theory, my Dad is alive.
There are not that many images of my dad that exist today. He had a fondness for taking photos and super 8 films, but somehow never ended up in the pictures of the film. A few years ago, I discovered a five minute or so role of film in my mom’s hall closet. I took that film to a place where I used to live in Forest Park. There they converted the 8 millimeter strip to a video tape.
When I got it back, I watched what was on it. What played across the screen, was a brief history of us kids. Summer time in the backyard, with my brother and sister playing in the plastic pool. My little sister, just learning to walk, the pond beyond our property. The scenes shift to me playing cars with my siblings, shifts back to a snow covered yard and then back to a gathering in my moms house. And it is here, in a flash of maybe a second or two, is my father. He looks at the camera, and smiles a bit (though, I wonder if its just the bright light that forces the smile). It’s the only “moving” picture that I think exists of him.
My mom has pictures of him before they got married and a few of him in uniform during the Korean War -though I’m not sure he ever served there. But that is all that remains of him.
I’ve tried to remember him, what his voice sounded like, but I have no physical memory of him. And to this day, I wonder what is real or what has been placed in my mind by my mother and my Uncle Harold, who seemed to have great admiration of him.
Its bizarre to think that 39 years has gone without him here. And I wonder, a lot now, what life we all would’ve lead had he not died on the July day in 1968. I know its silly, and ultimately pointless, but I still would like to see that version of my world.
Would my parents still been married (it would be 49 years this year)? Would we all been more successful in life, would I be living in California as I do now?
Would I still have been gay?
So many things, so much potential lost in the fog of history. And while I’m happy for my life now, and while I’m happy my mom has finally found a man who worships the ground she walks on and I love him dearly, I wish 1968 never happened.
I wish that I could travel back to July of that year (or even earlier, at the time he took up smoking) and prevented his death. Though, I now realize that the cancer that eventually killed him was not caused fully by the smoking.
I realize the foolishness of that first sentence, but it does not change my feelings. I know that had he not died, my life and life of my siblings would’ve been better. I cannot explain why I know this, but I do.
God has a lot to answer for, believe you me. He needs to explain to me why this happened, what great purpose it served for four kids to grow up without a father.
Happy Birthday, Dad.
I miss you!
1 comment:
Truly touching... I wish I had the words to express my thoughts, but they escape me at the moment.
I wish you and your family all the best.
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