With a small crowd going to show up tomorrow for Father's Day cookout, I was thinking about my dad. He died early in my life and it was a terrific jolt to me. He was really a hell of a guy. A Seabee during World War 2, he served in the Philippines, Leyte Gulf, and around that area. He was a great mechanic, designing tools for the company he worked for. He was a workaholic. I am sure I would have turned out better if he had been around. And for sure I would have turned out different. He was for all his good, totally against art as a career. Which would have probably resulted in one of us leaving, and we all know who that would have been. I am sure we would have butted heads a few times.
But I also remember how much he did for me.....from building the world's strongest swing set that still stands today at our old house and I am sure will survive everything short of a 50 kilo-ton nuke! To pulling me around the Nebraska State Fair in a wagon with my broken ankle to see Roy Rogers, to giving me my first dog.
Ever since I was a kid, when we returned to our hometown in Nebraska, everyone knew me instantly because I look like him. I can only hope I act a little like him.
thanks Pop......I never got to call him that, I would have liked too.
