Through Dad's Eyes

by Loretta Berry (United States of America)

I didn't expect to find USA

Through Dad's Eyes I'd never been particularly close to my Dad. Growing up he was a stern figure, a disciplinarian. Later in life, I realized that he had to be strict. He and my Mom had 12 kids. It must have been like raising an army – discipline was vital. Dad was a man of few words, saying what needed to be said and doing what needed to be done. No excessive warm and fuzzies issued in our household. After Mom died, Dad started opening up a bit more. He began telling stories -- Growing up on Long Island in New York, traveling with Mom when they were young, serving aboard the USS Essex in the Japanese theater during WWII. I enjoyed hearing his stories and began visiting him more often. We grew closer and I began to care for him as I took care of him. A few years ago Dad's best friend of 80 years passed away. These two men maintained a friendship since they were eight years old. He asked me to drive him to West Virginia to say goodbye to his life-long friend and lay him to rest. We lived in California. The funeral was on Tuesday. He asked me on Friday. We settled on flying out and driving back. While in West Virginia Dad had an idea. Why not take an extended road trip on the way home to visit relatives and….wait...what? Okay Dad, sounds like fun. I was able to clear my calendar back home and was happy that I could take my 89-year old Dad on a road trip. (Didn't I see a movie like this that ended badly?) We spent three days reminiscing with Adler's family. Then the road trip commenced. Leaving New York, crossing the border into Connecticut, brought on the story of Dad and Adler's road trip when they were 16-years old. They wanted to go to the 1939 World's Fair in San Francisco so they “ran away” from home on a trek across the country on foot. Visiting Long Island, New York where Dad grew up had a big impact on me. As we traveled to his boyhood home, we drove on the same roads he did when he worked in Connecticut as a young man. I learned that after he and Mom married they stayed in the upstairs of that same house while trying to get on their feet. Time stood still (or rather rewound) as we walked up to the front of this unassuming little house on a street that Dad remembers being dirt when he grew up. He pointed out the home Adler moved into when they were boys, the back fence their Mom's talked over, the upstairs window. Walking around he pointed out various landmarks he remembered, certain houses and the folks that had lived in them, what each building used to be, the places he hung out growing up. The neighborhood grocery store where he worked as a teen the day WWII broke out. He quit that day to join the Navy. We drove a short distance and came to the Catholic school that he attended as a boy. I can't explain how I felt climbing those five red brick steps – the same steps that my Dad climbed for years as a child – grasping the same brass handle on the same door that he did so long ago. That moment may have been more moving for me than for my Dad. Dad reminisced as we drove past Coney Island and Belmont Park, places he and his friends went to many times. Over the bridge into New Jersey. “Take the turnpike,” Dad said, “It's a nickel”. Most of the trip was fun. Some of the trip, not so much -- Dad's controlling (fatherly) attitude. I was 53-years old. You would have thought I had never driven a car a day in my life before this trip. I knew he wanted so much to be independent, to be the man (to be the one driving), but at the same time knew his limitations. I'm sure it was as hard on him, at times, as it was on me. We drove through 21 states visiting more than 30 relatives. I learned a lot about my Dad on this trip. Oh, not just his quirks and habits. I learned about...him. As a boy growing up in the depression era, as a young man going off to war, a newly married man, his love for adventure and traveling. I learned about the things that made him the man he is today. My Dad.