Memories of Dad

Dad and me, May 17, 1961

 It was my Dad's birthday yesterday.

He passed away on Remembrance Day in 2016. For a few years the arrival of his birthday was tough on us, but it's not been as strong a sense of loss recently. That's how it's supposed to work, I hear. 

But for some reason, yesterday's birthday came with some very unexpected, seemingly unrelated events which all brought his memory squarely into the front of my mind. 

I don't think I'll be able to adequately explain all of the connections, but I'm certainly going to try in this wee post.

First of all, Dad instilled in me the love of playing the piano. He was very talented (and his older sister was a piano teacher for many years), and I loved to hear him sit down and pour something out. So his 88th birthday, which was yesterday, is a very significant one, as there are 88 keys on a piano. 

Secondly, I took an animal transport call for an injured rabbit yesterday. The pickup was in Bowmanville, but it wasn't until I was almost there that I realized the significance of being in that town on his birthday. My Dad passed away in a care facility in Bowmanville, having spent his last few months on earth there. I've always been grateful he didn't live long enough to be stuck there with no visitors during the lockdowns. He had impeccable timing, actually, as he had breakfast on November 9, 2016, then learned of Trump's election, and immediately fell into a coma from which he only very briefly emerged (this story has the details of that) before passing away later in the week. My running dark joke is that Trump killed him, but either way I do think it's funny that he lingered for a few years after his last major stroke before just saying "enough" right after he heard that news. 

Next we have the news of Raquel Welch's passing. This connection is an odd one. I used to watch Laugh-In with my folks as a young man, late in its run. One night there was a joke that Dan Rowan delivered during the "News of the Future" segment, and my Dad laughed so hard at it I thought he was going to hurt himself. Being eight or nine years old, I didn't understand it so I asked him to explain it to me. He took his time, trying to figure out exactly what to say, but eventually told me something to the effect that "Raquel Welch was known for a rather large chest," demonstrating this with his hands. I think this must have been very brave of him, because my Mom was there, too, and I'm absolutely certain this did not sit well with her. In any event, I went through myriad old YouTube videos and finally found the clip in question a couple of weeks ago. You can share in the joy at the link below:

Mermaid At The Pentagon News | Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In | George Schlatter - YouTube

I can see exactly where all of us were when this happened, like it was yesterday. But until I found this online, I had only heard this joke that one time, over 50 years ago. Unbelievable. 

Then finally I saw a couple of clips today from a show I don't happen to watch these days, but have in the past. The show is The Masked Singer and there was a pretty spectacular "reveal" on the most recent episode, which I learned of today. 

When I was a very young man, I loved The Dick Van Dyke show. Though the resemblance was slight (they were both tall, thin, and dark-haired), he always reminded me of my Dad in those days. I was about the age of Richie when I watched the series in syndication, and then throw in the two huge kids' movies he starred in during the '60s (Mary Poppins and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang) and you can understand how important DVD was to me back then. But it truly was how much of my Dad I saw in him that started it all. And there he was on the stage at 97 years young, in a reveal so legendary it reduced at least one of the panel to tears. 


So. There are all the very weird connections to my Dad that popped up in the past 36 or so hours. We all miss him a lot, but it really seems he's not gone all that far away.