Love and fathers.

Today is Father's Day, and Dad is on everyone's mind.

I can't really relate to Mothers and their female offspring, but I can speak a word or two about fathers and sons.

My dad wasn't really a touchy-feely kinda guy. Save for WWII and the GI Bill, I doubt my father would have ever seen the inside of a college classroom. He was raised on a farm deep in the mountains, the second set of offspring from my grandfather's second wife. From what I understand talking with my aunts and uncles, Grandpaw Whitson was a ruthless disciplinarian with little time for shenanigans. Pop loved him, but decided to strike out on his own at an early age.

After leaving home for the Baltimore shipyards, he enlisted in the Army and served in the Field Artillery. Home from occupation duties, he made his way to East Tennessee State University and studied History and Physical Education.

Pop didn't have much of an affectionate way with kids. He kinda thought his lot was to make sure we didn't grow up hoodlums. His place in our family was along the lines of Judge and Jury, with swift justice being the main reason for his existence. If we ever needed soft guidance in matters of the heart or world that was up to mom.

The worst thing you could hear in our home was "Wait til Dad gets home". Those words instilled more fear on my brothers and I than about anything else you could hear. I'm not quite sure "grounding" had even been invented yet, because we usually saw whippings.

Pop wasn't without an occasional soft side. He loved to share his knowledge of cars, carpentry, and lawn care though we usually didn't see that as much more than another set of chores to complete. I will have to say that I couldn't hammer a nail straight or saw a board in half if I hadn't been cajoled into helping him with some of the literally hundreds of home improvement projects he oversaw over the years. Anything I know about car trading and haggling came from watching him shave a hundred bucks from a car salesman, or fifty cents from someone at a yard sale.

Pop was pretty vocal about our various career choices; he didn't care for any of ours. I think he was just wanting us to get a little bit farther than he did. His candidness about how we'd turn out was just as full of truth though we couldn't see it at the time. One brother of mine died penniless and in poor health, the other saw his money dwindle down before he drank himself to death. I'm still a "work in progress" so we'll have to see if I wind up in the poor house.

I never quite understood my father. He spent over 30 years working at a job he hated, while I work at something that will never get me rich, but I enjoy doing.

I spent a good deal of my life at odds with my father. It took the birth of my own son to bring us closer together. Seeing them interact and play on visits warmed my heart to him, and actually got through my thick skull that for all the imperfections our children and parents may have, we love them just the same. It also opened my eyes to fact that as a father, it is realy important to hear "I love you" every once in awhile.

I'm really glad I got to say those words to pop before he passed away.

Yeah Pop, I do love you.