On a scale of 1 to 10, I rate Father’s Day .380
Like many people my age, I’m an orphan now. My Father and Mother died within a month or two of each other so many decades ago that I can’t really remember the year.
I do, however, remember that June 20, 1920 was my Father’s birthday and as such falls on or near Father’s Day every year.
Though I am one, Father’s Day is not exactly my favorite celebration. Honoring “Dear Old Dad” is not really my thing. And so, while a couple of weeks ago others posted fond memories of their Fathers to celebrate them, I didn’t. I simply did not want to add a dose of depression in the midst of all the hoopla about everybody’s happy memories.
Sadly, I didn’t go to see my Father when he was dying. Nor did I go to his funeral. And, if you knew the real story, you might not blame me all that much.
My father went off to join the Army Air Corp in 1938 at the age of 18 with his best friend Bob Sampson because the recruiter told them they could see the world and that girls liked the uniform.
In those days, soldiers could have a personal side-arm if they chose. As my Father’s family was from Ilion, New York — home of Eliphalet Remington and the Remington Arms Company where my grandfather worked, the weapon of choice was the Remington Model 51, a .380 caliber automatic that had begun manufacture in 1911 and was said to be a favorite of many because it handled like a Colt .45 but was lighter and more accurate.
General George Patton supposedly owned one.
And so, imagine my surprise to be awakened one night by an argument between my father and mother, and me rushing downstairs behind my brother to reach the bottom of the stairs only to discover my father in a fit of rage holding the gun on my mother.
It was my brother who distracted my father with a simple shout of “Dad! What the fuck are you doing?,” which calmed him long enough to lower the gun.
I presume that if he was really going to shoot my Mother, he wasn’t going to do it in front of his sons.
But you never know. He wasn’t all that pleasant of a guy.
My father’s anger then focused on my brother and the gun was momentarily forgotten. Another argument ensued with my father shouting with scorn at my older sibling one of his pearls of wisdom like, “YOU THINK YOUR SHIT DOESN’T STINK, DON’T YOU?!” and the two of them madly driving to the settle the argument not with a fist fight, but a race around the high school track. Odd.
Fortunately, he had left the gun behind. My Mother — a pretty fair gun handler herself — unloaded the gun, hid the bullets and the clip then called the state troopers to come to the house.
They arrived just as my father and brother returned. Silent. Sullen. Tears on my brother’s face.
I remember one of the troopers, who knew my father (things were different in those days, everyone knew everyone) saying, “Trace, what’s going on here?” And the two of them going outside to talk and smoke cigarettes, while the other officer — who was also a friend of the family, talked to the rest of us.
My Mother was incredibly calm. My brother — probably 15 at the time and 5 years older than I was, showed remarkable coolness. I simply cried silently, wondering just what in the hell was going to happen next.
After a couple of hours, the troopers left. And, they told my Mother, “Call us if anything else gets out of hand”. And “Tracy, you ok?” No arrests. No protective services. No social workers.
Like I said, things were different back then.
I can’t say though that I ever really liked my father much after that. He was, after all, really pretty much a son-of-a-bitch.
Did it scar me for life? Probably. At the very least it left me with a kind of uncertainty about Father’s Day celebrations. But one thing is certain. The mystery of what caused two people who loved each other enough to marry and have children to end up in such a situation has puzzled me for over 50 years.