This is my first follow up post to the overview of what’s been going on with me over the past few months, specifically #4- if there’s a traumatic event in your past that you haven’t dealt with- deal with it. Mine is fairly simple to explain- much harder to actually address:
My amazing daughter, Josephine, was born on Jan 9, 2006. My amazing father had died on January 7, 2006 after a 10-year battle with Alzheimer’s. As you might imagine, I never processed my father’s death and never fully grieved.
My father was born in 1926 in Hartford CT and became a child of the depression in many ways; his father had a good job, but got very ill and then passed away when my father was 16. My father started supporting his family financially when he was 15 or so; as his older brother was dealing with tuberculosis and there was no other bread-winner.
His teenage schedule went like this:
-6:30- up and on the city bus, where he did is schoolwork.
-7:30- arrive at school; study and start class at 8.
-2:30- school over, off to mandatory athletics.
-4:30- back on the bus to his job as an orderly at a hospital.
-5:30-9 bedpans and bed-making.
Can you imagine?
Based on his need to provide for the family, he decided to attend the US Naval Academy, where he would be paid for attending school. He entered in 1944 and graduated in 3 years after the war was concluded. He spent 6 years or so in the Navy and then went on to a job with the Container Corporation of America, where he eventually met my mother, fell in love and moved to Doylestown, PA.; where I grew up; to manage one of my family’s newspapers, a job he held until he retired in 2000. A number of people pulled me aside after his passing to tell a small story about he positively impacted their life; in ways they will never forget. He almost never missed a game, doted on my mother and had a large impact on many of the people who worked for him as well as other folks in our town.
When I started to feel ill, I started working with a counselor and we identified not having dealt with the grief as a major cause of my stress. Mostly, I had not flushed the bad memories of my father’s horrific disease and focused on the memories of him when he was healthy, which are awesome memories. She suggested I write stories about his life and my life with him to rekindle the good memories- I did it and it helped immeasurably .
Here’s one of my favorite stories that I recently wrote- a story that he loved to tell:
When my father was a teenager, he had to support his family so he began driving his brother’s car around Hartford, despite the fact that he didn’t have a driver’s license. He drove for a long while without one and then decided that he should probably get legal, so he drove himself to the test. He parked the car and went inside, where he was promptly told that he car was in the wrong place for driving tests and that he couldn’t move it himself, because he didn’t have a license, and oh, by the way, how did you get here? He went outside and tried to figure out what to do. He waited a while and then figured he would just have to fess up. He returned to the desk, where a new man was in charge. “Chuckie Smith, is that you? Why are you here? You need a driver’s license? Oh, I’ve seen you driving around- no need to take the test.” The new guy was an old friend of my dad’s father! He was a terrible driver for the rest of his life!
I miss him terribly and always will. The fact that neither of my children ever met the real him will always make me sad. I have, however, refreshed my memories of him and now am much better off having dealt with his passing.
One great thing to come of this process is my family’s recent decision to start a scholarship fund to help a day student at his old school. My father went to private school for free (all of the students did where he went until 1965 or so) and helping out other students in the same way has great appeal to us and we’re making it happen.
If it’s stuck in there, it will come out and you won’t be able to control when, unless you deal with it head on!
