[Funeral is Tuesday. I am working on remarks. Has there ever been such a hideous year?] As I am both a net surfer and sports fan, I sometimes visit internet sports chat rooms. Sometimes we have what is called an “OT” , for off topic, discussion. One year on Fathers’ Day, a thread was started, “what would you thank your father for?” Most participants were men and gave mostly sports-related answers; their fathers had played sports with them, taken them to sporting events, or explained rules of a particular sport. I replied that I would thank my father for his belief in equality of women, and that my life would have been quite different had this not been the case. He was a man of his time; my mother took primary responsibility for the household and just last year I had to give him a serious scolding about his bad habit of commenting on women’s weight. But I knew from about age 7 I was going to college. I never heard any of the nonsense that boys get educated and girls get married. I never heard I was not supposed to be good at science and math. When I accelerated my high school, my mother was nervous about my starting college young, but my father pointed out he had started college at age 16. If it was OK for a young man, it was OK for a young woman. While my siblings and I were growing up, my mother started college to realize her dream of becoming a teacher. He did not complain it was interfering with his comfort, or ridicule a woman of her age going back to school. He pitched in to support her. After my mother died, my father married Babette and we enlarged our family with Toni, Courtney, Tracy, and their partners and children. I was surprised when I first met Babette as I expected she would look like my mother. She was actually opposite. I soon learned they were sisters under the skin; both smart, outspoken, progressive, and humorous. My father married two independent, strong-minded women. Sadly, he did not see another become President of the United States, and marveled how an ignorant unqualified unstable bigot, because he’s a man, could be considered the better candidate. My father also fought his entire life for social justice. As a young man, he worked at the Highlander Tennessee Folk School, a labor and civil rights leadership training school. One of the people he met there was a young banjo-strummer who wanted to change the world with music. His name was Pete Seeger. My father knew Pete Seeger before he knew my mother. Others who passed through Highlander Folk School included well known names like Rosa Parks, Ralph Abernathy, Martin Luther King; overall nearly 100,000 people. Because they advocated universal education and racial equality, they were under attack by the Ku Klux Klan and participants, my father included, took turns standing armed guard. Of course, before going to Tennessee he had to clear it with the rabbi, because kosher food would not be available. My father was above all a man of great integrity. One story sums it up. He taught developmentally disabled students when many thought these students were incapable of learning and had to be warehoused in institutions. He developed through his own efforts training programs for them. When the law changed to require equal education for disabled students, there was a lack of teachers with appropriate credentials for special education. My father was asked to teach an accelerated program in college so teachers could get special certification; at first part time, with a chance to become a full time job. Teaching college was easier, and paid better, than classroom teaching. His first semester, for their final project, he asked each person to present a lesson plan. Most of them were acceptable but a few were garbage, showing no thought. Some were clearly plagiarized. He flunked those students. They went crying to the dean and the dean told him to change the grades. My father said he cared too much about the children who would eventually be taught to saddle them with incompetent apathetic teachers. When the dean insisted, my father resigned. He needed the money, and he was not so young any more; he could have used the easier job. But he would not advance his career at the cost of his integrity. Antes de cerrar, quisiera agradecer a Alma, la querida amiga y ayudante a mi padre. Ella cuidaba la casa, instaba a papá a cuidarse a sí mismo, insistía en que acudiera a sus citas con el médico. Traía su perrito para visitarlo. Más que todo, evitaba que él se quedara solo. Sin ella, la vida de mi padre habría sido más corta y sin duda más solitaria. Alma, de veras eres una alma buena. My father carried the torch of equality, justice, and integrity for 95 years. We are now faced with a new challenge; everything he believed in, everything we have won, is now in danger of a full frontal assault. The torch has been passed to our generations. We cannot drop it.
Stopped reading, making me tear up. My condolences and also wish my father was half the man. RIP No matter the political disagreement, family is foremost.
Much love to you. Everyone has flaws and no one is a perfect person, but, it sounds like you had a pretty amazing father. Just remember how great he was for you. Not all of us had that. I am sorry for your loss.
So sorry to hear about your loss, cran. It's been a tough year for you, indeed. Stay strong and I'll say an extra prayer for you tonight.
Your dad sounds like he was quite a man, crandc. What a blessing to have had him in your life for so many years. I lost my dad two years ago, just before his 86th birthday, so I know from personal experience that no matter how elderly a parent may be, the pain is still strong when they are suddenly gone from your life. My sympathies to you and your family. I'm glad that you'll be able to turn the page in just a few weeks on what, for you, has been a dreadful year. May 2017 bring peace and renewal to you.
May his memory be a blessing, and you do him justice by being the strong, smart, independent, menschy woman you clearly are.
Derp....sorry. I didn't think we had any wimmenz on this forum. For the record, I believe Sly is secretly an old Transvestite from San Francisco. But tell no-one.
You make him a proud father...I could only hope my son would write one as touching for me one day.....I was not close to mine so tried to make up for it as best I could with my own....really sorry for your loss ..he sounds like a good man
Sorry for your loss. If in the end a man can be so highly thought of, that is of itself the truest reward.
Thanks for kind replies. Back at work today. After the ceremonial tearing of garments, before making my remarks I tore again for the people killed in the warehouse fire in Oakland. While mourning my father I also mourn tragedy in my community. Kittens glad to see me, I think. They purred a lot yesterday.
