Monthly Archives: November 2022

My daddy was a quiet man.  He wasn’t a talker and we often spent time together watching television in silence.  Of course, it was always a western.  Sometimes I’ll watch a Western movie or television show just because it gives me a peaceful feeling, like I did when I was with daddy.  I can still hear the soundtrack to “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”  Whistle… whaa whaa whaa!  Ennio Morricone was a genius.

I also like to listen to old country music too, like Marty Robbins, Ray Price and Johnny Horton.  I can remember our old stereo that was as big as a dresser, where daddy would play his records and 8-track tapes.  We have old home movies of my brother and I dancing in our underwear.  You couldn’t hear the audio, but I can just imagine the words to the songs playing…

Out in the West Texas town of El Paso
I fell in love with a Mexican girl
Nighttime would find me in Rosa’s cantina
Music would play and Felina would whirl

 Or

In 1814, we took a little trip
Along with Colonel Jackson down the mighty Mississip’
We took a little bacon, and we took a little beans
And we caught the bloody British in the town of New Orleans

We fired our guns and the British kept a-comin’
There wasn’t as many as there was a while ago
We fired once more and they began to runnin’
On down the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico

 

I can just imagine him smiling and enjoying the music.  When I was little, he always had a cigarette in one hand and a Pabst Blue Ribbon in the other.  He rarely got drunk, that I saw, but if he did have too much, he would always tell me how much he loved me and how he was sorry that he didn’t tell me enough (how much he loved me.)  I guess that worried him for some reason.  

Daddy could fix anything.  He was very handy around the house and mama never thought to call a repairman for anything because if it was broken, daddy could fix it.  He loved his tools and had two or 10 of everything. I think he kept the Mac tool truck in business when he worked at Blue Ridge Kenworth.  He wouldn’t think of buying a new shirt, but he would buy every kind of hammer or wrench that was available, along with a fancy knife or two.

He also loved NASCAR and got a big kick out of it when someone said he looked like Dale Earnhardt.  I also thought he looked like Sonny Bono when he let his hair grow longer.  One time my aunt Eula gave him a perm.  We laughed and laughed.  He loved jeans and shirts with pockets in them.  The pockets always came in handy, earlier in his life for his cigarettes and later for pens or a receipt or something.

After daddy and mama divorced, he pursued another passion of his, cooking. My daddy was a great cook. Some of his signature dishes included chili, omelets, Mexican cornbread and chocolate chip cake. He often stayed with his mother in Florida because she was showing signs of dementia. He would often cook for her except when they went to Taco Bell to get a taco salad, which was her obsession. Daddy said sometimes she would forget she had it at lunch and she wanted it again for dinner. Daddy was sick of Taco Bell. He would sometimes tell me, “If I ever get in such a shape, just shoot me.”

Granny lived until she was almost 98 and by that time daddy was showing signs of dementia too.  He was beginning to repeat himself, which I find myself doing now.  It’s scary when you know what is coming because I’ve seen what my daddy went through until his death in March 2022.  At first, it’s just little things.  You forget who and what you’ve already told people.  You often hear, “Yeah, you already told me that.” But that’s nothing.  Seeing my daddy with that blank look in his eyes.  That’s the worst.  When he doesn’t even know his own daughter?  That’s pretty bad too.  He told me once that he felt like his head was going to explode.  I saw the scared look in his eyes, and it broke my heart.

Dementia is a horrible disease but also unpredictable.  Just when I thought daddy was completely gone, he would surprise me.  I would tell him I loved him, and he would look at me and say, “Well, I love you too.”  You often hear about people’s whole personality changing.  That never happened with him.  He was always sweet and kind, even until the end.  My stepmother, Evelyn, took such loving care of him.  Even after he moved to a nursing home, she was always there.  She loved him dearly and I was so thankful for that.  She also helped him to finally make that decision to be saved and baptized when he was 81.  Daddy grew up in the Church of Christ.  He knew the bible and had read it many times, but something always held him back.  I don’t know what demons he wrestled with or why it was so hard for him but better late than never.

Just before he died, one of the staff members shaved his mustache and goatee. When I saw him in his casket at the funeral, I was disturbed because it didn’t look like my daddy. I remember seeing him once in my whole life without a mustache. I was a little girl, and I didn’t like it. Children don’t want their parents to change. They find comfort in the sameness and predictability. Getting older is inevitable but it doesn’t mean we have to like it. As daddy used to say, “Getting old ain’t for sissies.”

I know at one time daddy had the same feelings I have now.  Is it happening to me?  When I voice my fears and concerns, my husband tells me, “Don’t worry, I won’t know what’s going on either.”  As with most people, I want to be independent.  I don’t want my children to have to take care of me.  If I have to go to a nursing home at some point, that’s okay too.  I know that whatever happens, it’s my personality to make the best of any situation.  I won’t mope and cry and I hope I always have a smile on my face.  

One thing I do know is that whatever happens, God will take care of me. Because of Jesus, I have comfort in knowing that good things await me when I die or when Jesus returns. This life is just a moment in time compared to eternity in Heaven.