Memories of My Father

Fedoras and three piece suits.
Suspenders, always, and collared shirts.
An undershirt, even on the hottest August day in the middle of harvest.
Sweat stains.
“Heeeyy??” ~ loudly and with a steadily rising inflection. An indication he had not heard what was said.

Not a day off in his life (according to him).
“Christmas … tomfoolery. A waste.”
Torching the Chrismas pudding with rye whiskey. Smiling. The best part of the day for him.

The pen game ~ me, stretched over his lap as he drew letters and eventually words on my back with the top of a ball point pen. Guessing made me giggle. Made him giggle too. Our only shared game.

That funny walk, head down, lurching forward.

The one kiss I witnessed between my parents, as seen from the back seat of the car. We were at the airport. A peck goodbye. Goodbye.
Then there was the time he left and went to England, without luggage, and without mentioning anything about this to us.
No goodbye that time.

The newspaper, the London Free Press, every night. Blackened fingers.
The cough.
Steak and kidney pie with that fluffy flakey pastry on top.
Port.
Old cheddar cheese.
Butter, always.
Colts.
Rye whiskey.
Chewing rather than smoking cigars. Spitting.

Me holding the worklamp for him under the tractor/combine harvester/truck he was fixing late at night. “If you can see, I can see.”
Those peculiar English turns of phrase:

• Use the business end.
• You needing to look after Little Mary?
• Put a little English on it.
• My head is here, my ass is comin’.
• Ass over tea kettle.

Teaching me to drive a tractor before I could properly reach the pedals. Letting me run the harrows over a field. In fourth gear. Laughing.
Letting me park the combine harvester, driven with levers and pedals rather than a steering wheel, in the implement shed. A huge machine. A small opening. He thought I could do it. He was right. I was 9 or so.

Sometimes you have to kill your own food. My father did, being at the tail end of a generational succession of butchers.
Carving knives and sharpening steels, wielded.

The broken ankle as he tried to unjam the combine harvester.
The severed finger in the post hole auger.

Long involved stories over lunch. Or dinner. Fables, frauds and embellishments.
No eye contact with my mother, ever.
Disparaging under his breath.
Indulgent glances at me as I attempted to participate in adult conversation at dinner. Especially the “how do we fix the cultivator?” conversations. Smiling.

Not remembering my name.

Taking me to the horse races. Teaching me how to read the racing program. A useful life skill, surely.
Dozing off, prone in the backseat, no seat belt. The swerving of the car as he dozed off, too, felt like rocking.

Playing cards. The sweet plastic smell of a fresh deck.
Five card stud. Seven card stud.
Straight draw, one-eyed jacks are wild.
Rummoli.

That funny walk, head down, lurching forward, saves my ass as he fails to notice the huge hole I ripped in the hood of the pick-up truck when I drove it into the corn header on the combine harvester. My brothers take the fall, only because they saw me do it and nearly kill myself. I was 10 or so and following my father’s instructions to pick him up in the field. Had just been taught how to drive “three on the tree” the night before, by my father. I couldn’t reach the clutch, or the brake, properly.

Fewer stories.

Not remembering my brothers’ names.

The auction, selling off equipment and land. Mud, too many people, confusion. He let me hold the cheque at dinner. The house and shed remained. Father did not.

Erratic absences. Extended absences.

The phone call from the hospital. “Your father was run over by a snowmobile.” “How is this possible? It is June.” Shrugging. Another story to tell.

Not remembering anyones’ name. No one mentions this.

The phone call from the hospital. “Your father was hit by a train at the level crossing.” A longer stay this time as trains are bigger than snowmobiles regardless of season. Another story to tell.

Disappeared. Silence. No stories. Years pass. Shrugging.

The sudden return, with the announcement that the house and shed were now on the market too. No one is upset about this but me.

Being yanked out of class in high school to go look at houses “for your mother”. Because they did not speak.

Packing. Finding:

• a drawer full of prescriptions, years worth, unfinished
• a drawer full of dentures and dental plates
• a drawer full of hearing aids and batteries
• a drawer full of cigar boxes

Uprooting. No goodbye. Bitter.

Disappeared again.

Hitch-hiking in a fedora and three-piece suit. On Hwy. 81. In July. He does not recognize either my brother or me. He makes small talk and asks to be dropped at a major intersection in London. This is even weirder than being hit by a snowmobile in June, o those many years ago.

Found by my brothers in squalor. Removed to Highbury Hilton for assessment. A nursing home is found. Nasty, frightening place. Personal items stolen. Smells not in the slightest of sweat, port, cigars or whiskey.

Remembering nothing, fragments of stories, like tape loops, get triggered from the middle, often, and have no beginning or end. Fuzzy eyes.

Gone. No goodbyes. No more stories.