My Old Man

I have been thinking aout my dad alot recently. That will happen when you are desperately lonely & 4000 miles from anyone who gives a fuck about you. Anyway, if you were lucky enough to have known my dad, well then you know they dont make them like that anymore. On my best day I am not 1/10th the man he was. And frankly ( no pun intended ) I dont know too many men who are either. He cherished his family first and last. He worked his ass off so that our family had whatever we needed and most of what we wanted too. His idea of love was food and shelter and a new bike and whatever else his snotnosed kides wanted. He did not tell me he loved me very much but it was never an issue. When you fell down and hurt yourself he yelled at you because he didnt know how to make it better. He went to work sick or with broken ribs or whatever. He was relentless that way. It came at a price though. He wasnt the play catch kinda dad or take ya to the fishing hole dad either. I did see many roller derby's and AWA wrestling matches that most kids would have loved to have seen these days. I met Bobby Heenan and Ivan Kolov ( not a native Russian in case you were wondering ) and even Jesse Jackson when my Mom wanted me out of the house on a Sunday. He provided more wisdom from his glider in the back yard than any 5 phillosophers ever could have. He was as prejudiced as the day was long and also treated his women loike china dolls. But other than one of his dickhead brothers, I never met anyone who didnt love him. Like I said, on my best day I wasnt worthy to light one of the cigarettes that killed him. To this day, I cant think of bad thing to say about him. How many people can you say that about. When he died they had to wake him for 2 days so that everyone who's life he touched could say goodbye. I wonder what he would say about his youngest son living 4000 miles from his family. Would he be angry? Proud? Some days I think I can answer that. Today I am struggling for an answer.