I Thought My Father Was God

Live Oak, June 17, 2007

Rev. Kathleen Ellis

National Public Radio was advertising a special Father’s Day program, and this statement caught my ear: “To this day I’ve tried to become half the man my father was.” Boys learn to be men from male role models, whether or not they are biological fathers. How wonderful it is to observe the better parts of parenting and to see young men follow in those big shoes. The program known as Big Brothers—and also church members—can help so much when there’s no father in the home.

Today I’ll be taking you with me on my trip down memory lane, followed by some wisdom gleaned from other stories about fathers. I hope you will be reminded of your own childhood or perhaps your own parenting experiences.

I thought my father was God, or next in command. In my own family of origin, Daddy was definitely the head of household, the breadwinner, the ultimate disciplinarian, the inscrutable, the ingenious, the vengeful. Some of the attributes have been ascribed to the wrathful Jehovah, who after all, was referred to as Our Father … Yaweh could certainly destroy people—even whole cities—for disobedience, perhaps even for disrespect.

My siblings and I grew up in fear of our father. Our mother was afraid of him, too, although that showed only in subtle ways. While he was at work or out of town, we enjoyed a lot of laughter, silliness and singing. But the second we heard his customary whistle on the way to the door, we all sat up straight and acted busy or fled to our rooms.

Dinnertime was always at 6PM, when we had to be seated at the table and display our best manners, or risk Daddy’s displeasure. He would torment us with narrative mathematical problems like when one train is going 50 mph and another is going 30 from the other direction, how long would it take for them to meet? No matter how hard we tried, we never got things exactly right. We were never good enough to please him. Still, I’d rather remember the good times than dwell on the bad ones, especially on Father’s Day. I can empathize, though, with people who grew up in very difficult situations. Not all dads qualify as Father of the Year! But I learned to be tough, strong, and stubborn when I need to be.

I was born on Father’s Day, and it always felt a little special when my birthday fell on that particular Sunday. He and I both favored lemon ice box pie, the delicacy made with a Vanilla Wafer crust, Eagle brand sweetened condensed milk, fresh lemons, and a whipped cream topping. Only rarely did my mother make those pies, except one for my birthday and one for Father’s Day.

During World War II, Daddy served in the Army, stationed in Iceland and The Philippines. He acquired a cockatoo from The Philippines, named her Molly, taught her a few tricks, and brought her home when she was about six months old. Molly was a little older than I was, and lived with us for 30 years or more. She would eat any fruit or vegetable we cared to give her as a treat, but her favorites were ice cream and peanut butter. Well, maybe the peanut butter was our favorite because it was so funny to watch her eat it!

Along with Molly, we had a succession of interesting pets, each with an appropriate cage and diet. We had a monkey, an alligator, lizards and snakes, turtles, and almost always a canary, parakeet, or finch. For years we begged for a dog, but Daddy wouldn’t let us have one until our little brother was in second grade. (We don’t know why he was so special.) As you might expect from a second grader, he named the fox terrier Spot, over my protests. Long after we kids had left home, Spot was Daddy’s dog.

Whenever we got in trouble—usually at school—we’d also get a spanking from our mother, then she’d tell our father. Not only did we get the dreaded lecture from him, but we would also have to go out to get a willow switch for our own whippings. My sister Jean refused to cry, and she bore the brunt of his wrath and punishment. I learned a lot from her about how not to behave!

From the time I was 8 years old, we lived on a corner lot behind the high school. A long-standing chore was to keep the lawn free of litter, twigs and branches. Our father wouldn’t let us mow the lawn, but he expected us to pick up branches and other obstacles ahead of time.

Daddy worked as a geologist for Gulf Oil in Shreveport, LA; Jackson, MS; in Africa and Spain; on the North Sea; off the Gulf Coast; and in remote oil fields all over the ArkLaTex, also known as Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas. From time to time he would pile us all in the car to go rock hunting. We’d stop at some isolated area and he would give each of us a sample bag with our name and date on it. I swear it felt like we stopped at every road cut and field for a thousand miles. But we did sometimes find interesting minerals or arrowheads.

All I wanted for Christmas the year I was about 10 was a pogo stick. Daddy was away on assignment that year. On Christmas Eve, Mama couldn’t find where he had hidden that pogo stick. A relay of phone calls ensued, and someone drove many miles to the rig. Then a relay of messages was sent back to Mama. The pogo stick was under the stairs by the garage where Daddy kept a lot of wood and outdoor tools. It was a great hiding place—I would never have dared get into his stuff. My best friend Virginia Hill and I must have jumped miles around the neighborhood. It was our primary form of entertainment and transportation for months.

The water heater in my house was in the corner of the kitchen, between the stove and a counter, and we had to wash it from time to time. I remember cleaning it one time while weeping over some parental injustice. Mama told me not to cry, but Daddy said I could cry if I wanted to. I was so grateful somehow, that he acknowledged my feelings and didn’t make me feel worse.

When I was 17, Daddy gave me two baby ducks for Easter. I named them Lancelot and Guinevere. They lived in my room for several months, then we moved them to the fenced backyard, where we had dug a small pond for them. We introduced them to the pond. The two of them stood on the edge of the water for a while, a little uncertain of what to do, but finally they swam really fast to the other side and looked surprised as they scrambled up the other side. They would often follow me around, so I loved to take them for a walk down the street. When we came to an intersection, it was quite a feat for them to climb up the curb on the other side. There was no Access of All Ducks in those days! One time when someone passed us in the other direction, one of the ducks got confused and started following the wrong set of feet.

Later that summer I went to camp for a week or two, and left Lancelot and Guinevere in the care of my brother and dad. When I came home, Daddy held me back in the living room with some very sad news for me. Spot, the dog, was chasing the ducks, and my brother was trying to catch them for safekeeping. In the confusion, he took an unfortunate step—right on Lancelot’s head. At least he didn’t suffer, but it was a terrible loss. I almost felt sorrier for my brother, who was 11 years old at the time. He was nice to me for the rest of the summer.

Not long after that, I was washing dishes with my mother and innocently asked, “What is the hardest thing about marriage?” I was shocked to hear her say, “I don’t like the sex.” Her reason? She didn’t like physical expression—she called it pawing, and had resented it for years. My mother taught me the basics about the reproductive cycle, but Daddy’s only reference to sexuality was in the car on the way to college, when he advised me to “watch out for the wolves.” Actually, that was pretty good advice! Still, the whole family could have benefited from Our Whole Lives sexuality training!

Eventually I married and bore two sons—in spite of my parents’ warnings. When they were old enough to play make believe games, I could not believe what a wonderful grandfather Daddy became. He would set up old Army field telephones for the boys. Another memorable game was created when Daddy mowed a path through the backyard and set up numbered stakes along the way. He gave each boy a jar with a single die in it to shake and determine how many spaces to go. At each stop, they had to read and follow the directions: Throw water from the bucket into the air and yell, “It’s raining! It’s raining!” or Dance a jig and sing, “I’m a dope! I’m a dope!” or Go directly to jail and miss one turn. Jail was the small space under a plant stand.

At one of our family funerals, Daddy wanted to dig bulbs from Grandma’s Farm before the land was sold. My sisters and I were all going to go—but suddenly one of them developed a headache and one found some other job she had to do. That left me alone with him, and I was really nervous. To my surprise and delight, we had a good time tramping through the woods and saving hundreds of bulbs. I still have some of them in my yard. Fortunately they keep growing in spite of my neglect. It’s always a surprise when Jon calls me over to see them in bloom year after year.

In his later years, Daddy developed dementia. My sister Jean moved him into a house near her own. She hired live-in help, but visited him every day and made sure his diet was compatible with dialysis. He hated dialysis and it was always a struggle to get him there. He died on New Year’s Day, 1998, while all of us were in town.

Mainly because of our lingering fear of Daddy, it was actually a relief when he died. We didn’t have to hug him anymore, tend to his needs, make polite conversation, or swallow our fear. As I reflected on this, the new thought occurred to me as to whether he’s in heaven or hell. The funny thing is, I don’t believe in either of them. (That could explain why I never thought about it before.) But it is an interesting thought: how did the good things he did weigh against the harm he inflicted on his family? If I had to, how would I judge him?

Frankly, I’m glad I don’t have to. Parenting is never easy; all parents struggle with their own limitations and weaknesses. Even so, they often do so much that is right against really tough odds. Sudden accident or illness can transform a father into a caregiver and single parent in a second. Dwight Alexander, whose wife was killed and two sons badly injured in a car accident, devoted his life to helping son Grant learn to walk again. Eight years later, he is remarried to Michelle Thompson, whose husband was killed in a motorcycle accident. In the den of their family home hang three pictures: family portraits of the Dwight and Tina Alexander family, the David and Michelle Thompson family, and the new Dwight and Michelle Thompson/Alexander family.

Dwight had this advice for dads in crisis: * You have to realize and then accept that you are single again, that you have to take on many of the roles that the "mom" used to do. It's hard because you find yourself at first feeling totally inadequate at the emotional stuff. * You also have to realize that your child's livelihood depends on you and only you. That can be frightening, overwhelming. * When someone you love is ill, you can't take no for an answer. They may tell you that person will never get well, but you can't believe that. You have to keep trying and believing it will be okay. * Focus on the positive. * Take one day at a time. * Live for the moment. Not yesterday, not tomorrow. * If your loved one has a brain injury, there is no immediate fix. Know it will be a long haul. * Never give up. Don't quit.

In a recent conversation with another father, Pete reflected on his own experiences as a father. For one birth, he and his wife were literally snowbound in Poughkeepsie, NY, when she went into labor. They couldn’t get out and they couldn’t get a cab, so they walked two miles to the hospital.

For the second birth, they were watching a movie “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kids” when she went into labor. He never got to see the end of that movie. The third pregnancy was planned, in part, “to save the marriage,” but it ended in divorce when their daughter was four years old.

Still, Pete says blended families are not all that bad. There are that many more parents who care about the children’s welfare. Things have changed a lot since he grew up. There is much more involvement of fathers with their children, including labor and delivery.

Pete learned a lot about parenting from his own father. In fact, he is amazed by how much his father did. His dad was President of the Disabled Veterans Association, he did all the grocery shopping, and he took the kids all over the place.

Through the generations, Pete has this wisdom to pass on: let your children be themselves, be a role model. For one notable example, Pete’s son has maintained a weekend commitment to his girlfriend’s child for 15 years so far. Even though the boy isn’t his child and he and the girlfriend broke up, he wanted the baby, now a teenager, to have a consistent role model. Best of all, he gave his dad Pete credit for modeling that kind of consistency.

Do what you say you’ll do. Let your children excel or fail in their own way. Be a role model, because they are watching you. My father was not God; he wasn’t even a saint. But he did his best, and I am the better for it.

Amen and Blessed Be