Well actually my step-dad. He was born in the depression, raised in northern Pennsylvania and Philadelphia. His childhood had not been the kindest, and his family suffered poverty, tragedy and harsh times, but it was full of adventures the way he told it. Stories of going to see movies for a nickel and living and working on a dairy farm at the age of 13.
As we got older, the adventures became more revealing. He waited till we were grown up to tell us about his Dad the bootlegger, or the fact that his Mom’s German family disowned her for marrying his dad, an Irish man. And that Dad left school when in the sixth grade to work on that dairy farm, and he sent his money home to his mother. We always knew that when he was 17 he joined the Navy, it was post world war 2 and he saw Europe from the bow of the boat mostly he said, and was honorably discharged four years later with his GI benefits. It wasn’t until we were older that he told us he got caught jumping ship in port 17 times!
After the Navy he returned home to Pennsylvania for a bit before he decided to go to Alaska to pan for gold. Somehow instead , he ended up in Southern California, living in Santa Monica, working at a job for Hughes Aircraft in El Segundo. Eventually he transferred to Hughes Fullerton. Which is how our adventure started. He met my mother at Hughes aircraft in Fullerton CA where he was her supervisor and married her when he was 32 and I was three.
Though he never formally adopted me, he never treated me as a step-daughter, I was his daughter, and I never saw him as a step father, but my Daddy from that time on. He quit Hughes to become a truck driver in the mid-sixties, he didn’t like having to wear a tie, and the money was better. He was gone for long stretches of time, and some summers our vacations were spent crossing the country with him driving the truck and my mom in the family car behind it. Not to say it was all warm and fuzzy all the time, my dad was a typical provider grumpy dad, like Red Foreman from that’s 70’s TV show, and my mom a stay at home mom.
After their divorce us kids ended up living with him. When we came to live with him, he had sold his truck to buy a business and the business wasn’t doing well and those were some tough times for him financially. Still, he managed to buy a house to put a roof over our heads and give us a home. But he literally was digging ditches and delivering phone books to make ends meet until he returned to truck driving.
This is where he taught us to make soft raisin cookies that his mom used to make for him, but kept to himself the trick he used for his macaroni and cheese so good you wanted it all the time. This is where he raised two teenage girls, as a single dad. He gave us enough freedom to make mistakes and support when we cried over them. But enough discipline to teach us responsibility and right from wrong. Ironically this tough grumpy guy became the homemaker for us, and to this day, I remain grateful for that home, and thankful that he was there for me.
