Wish You Were Here

The last couple of years my family lived in Winnipeg we lived on the air force base there because there were no available PMQ's available on the army base (we'd lived off-base until, I guess, it became too expensive). The elementary school I attended was just on the other side of the school's sports field. Being an army kid on an air force base wasn't always easy.

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I remember drinking with my old man and some of his old army buddies one night. I guess I must've been about 20 or 25. My dad went for a leak or something and one of his buddies leaned over the table at me and, getting all sincere, said, "You know, your old man could have gone a lot further in the army. He had too many friends, though..."

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One day my father was mowing the lawn. He was using an electric lawnmower. I think they were pretty common back in the 60's. Maybe they still are, I don't know. It was summertime, but I was in the basement shooting pucks at a concrete wall. I don't remember where my mom and sisters were. So, my dad's mowing the lawn. I can hear the electric hum of the mower as it cuts the grass. It stops, and just a moment later I hear my old man say, "Shit!" Not loudly, mind you...

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My dad loved to party. So do I. It was once a family tradition to have a party on Boxing Day, with family and friends and neighbors. I remember one year it was getting quite late and there were only a few people left at the party. My father was asleep (well, passed out) on the sofa. This guy, a neighbor who'd been sitting there the whole night drinking my old man's booze, turns to me and says, "You know, don't you, that your old man is an asshole?" This startled me a bit, so I asked him to repeat himself. He did. We were sitting near the fireplace, so my initial impulse was to club him with the poker, stuff him in, and burn him. Fortunately (for both of us), my father had taught me better. Instead, I just stood up and told him he had 30 seconds to finish his drink and get the fuck out and never come back. This loser actually had the nerve to appeal to my mother, who didn't even waste time getting details. "If my son says, get out, well then, get out." Yeah...

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So I go upstairs and outside to see what my dad is swearing about. Yikes. He's standing there with the index finger of one his hands kinda hanging there and bleeding. A lot. (I found out later that he'd turned off the mower to clean the blades. Apparently the blades of electric mowers can take a few seconds to stop after being turned off...) He pulls out a white handkerchief from his pocket, and as he's wrapping his hand he calmly asks me to to into the kitchen and get the car keys. A few seconds later I bring out the keys and he says, "Let's go for a drive." We go to the hospital and he gets his finger stitched back on. He never flinched. Not for a moment. I'll never forget it.

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My father died about 7 months before I came to Japan. He died too young (64). He never met my wife, or our daughter, or his recently born great-granddaughter (to my niece). His birthday would have been the 4th of July. My father was my biggest "fan." I remember, crying to my my mother as my father was dying, saying that I was nothing without him. Wish you were here...