My father was awesome! Although he died twenty years ago, his birthday was a couple of days ago. I still call my mom on his birthday; we both miss him.
My dad was kind of angry when he was young, until his late forties, I guess. He spent his time working on stuff in his shop, little inventions, collecting all kinds of stuff and organizing it. His anger came out mostly at the world at large, with lots of talk about what "they" were doing, meaning, I guess, Republicans, conservatives, wealthy people, religious people and anyone he thought was being greedy or short sighted.
Then, around the time his son came home from college with an African-American girlfriend (about 1968), he began to look more deeply inside himself. His politics and liberal religious ideas were supposed to make it okay for his son to marry a black woman; but when it was that close to home, he struggled. He and my mom came up with excuses like "What about the children?" and stuff like that. Eventually, they let go of all that stuff and embraced her fully.
My dad was an early participant in the human potential movement that began at Esalen in Big Sur, California. After attending several times, he got in touch with the realization that he lived his life from the standpoint of resentment. Seeing this helped to free him immensely. He began to really honor and own his positive emotions like the love he had for his kids. He had never been physically or verbally affectionate to us when we were small, but after this internal work, he began to do simple things like hug me when I got home, or tell me he was proud of me.
By the time he died (of a heart attack a week after the big Bay Area earthquake of 1989), he had helped hundreds of other people in group therapy sessions to learn to know themselves more fully. He sang bass in the college choir where he was well-loved. He learned to cook and do the laundry. He found joy in artisan blacksmithing which he shared with interested folks at historical national parks. He loved to make up stories for his grandchildren.
Thanks for the opportunity to share. I really appreciate thinking deeply about my dad.
