a father myself

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~ imPRESSions ~

Author's Notes/Comments: 

A repost from a long ways back. A bit playful, probably too much for some. It retains some of the fun that it first had. And the hope is that it will be enjoyable now as it was then. Too much glumness surrounds us of late.

S74rW4rd's picture

Not at all too playful. 

Not at all too playful.  Although I was adopted (and two of my three paternal cousins considered me "fake," until the evidence of our grandmother's youthful indiscretion proved that they were no more blood-related to him than I was), he loved me fiercely.  I regret that I was far too young to get to know him well before his passing.  He was a huge man, I thought him a giant.  Althouh I did not get along well with my father during my youth, I came to admire him---a road surveyor, and, later, a traffic control technician.  During my high school summers, I worked on one of the County's two surveying crews, and, daily, I worked with people who had worked with him or who he had trained.  They told me he was an absolute artist with the transit, turning angles and taking elevations himself rather than delegating it; and he turned angles once, and only once, unlike my supervisor during those summers.  The beltway around our municipal area, one of our state's largest cities, was built largely of existing roads that did not connect; and he performed the survey of the centerline and shoulders, every hundred feet at the end of that chain, by which the belt was interconnected.  That road runs near my home, and I feel safer on that road than on any other.  (I also got to help survey some of the small rural bridges, over creeks, culverts, and ditches, that had been built under my grandfather's supervision.)

   Sorry for the verbosity; I love to boast about my father and grandfather.  Your poem very effectively brought them to my immediate thoughts tonight, and I enjoyed reminiscing.  I hope your poem also reminds those who may be inconsiderate, as I was, toward their fathers---time is limited, do not waste it on grudges or disagreements.  My father and I reconciled dramatically after I nearly died from congestive heart failure, and six months before his own death.  Six months only.  Not nearly enough time, and the fault was mine.

   


Starward

arqios's picture

Oh but boast away. We only

Oh but boast away. We only had a one off trip across that city and I was quite impressed by the roads if not much else, that would be the most distinctive feature any city should have in a motoring world. We did feel safe driving around as we chased after the historical areas of interest, which we are wont to do when visiting other cities and places. It is gladdening in the heart that the poem stirred up such thoughts as not many of us have wholesome memories of childhood and fatherhood specifically, a lost vocation-art-privilege in our sadly rundown society. I am also thankful for the reconciliation that I and my father had, as much as we could muster over the last couple years of his life. Thanks kindly for sharing your journey (related to this topic) here.


here is poetry that doesn't always conform

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