trophies for first, second, and third place, as well as various ribbons for exceptional woodwork. Then they announced I had won the ribbon for a previously unmentioned category: “Best Homemade Car.” It was obvious they just made up that award, and I had the vague sense they were making fun of me, but I was glad to accept the ribbon anyway.
On the drive home, when I asked my dad what “Best Homemade Car” meant, he just laughed. “It means you were the only kid who did the car himself. Most of those kids weren’t even allowed to touch their cars.”
My dad’s a good sport, always up for an adventure, letting his kids talk our easily-talked-into-things dad into things. When I started reading books, he’d bring me books like Tom Sawyer , and when I started singing along to the radio, he brought me records like “American Pie.” When he was forty, working in a bank, he decided to go to law school at night, but he still coached my sisters’ basketball teams. (How did he do that? It’d be pointless to ask him. Maybe he doesn’t even know.)
He eventually quit his day job and started practicing law on his own when he was fifty. He has worked hard to make his life happen, but he doesn’t acknowledge any stress or strain about it at all. He has never worried about whether things will work out. He’s easy. He likes his habits—listening to the radio, drinking coffee, pronouncing the word California wrong (he calls it “Califonia.” Why? Nobody knows), calling blue jeans “dungies,” and speaking in his unreconstructed accent. When he was in the army, he went to Mass once and gave the responses in Latin, like everybody did back then. When the service was over, the chaplain asked, “So what part of Boston are you from?” That’s right: My dad’s Boston accent could make a man wince even when my dad was speaking Latin.
MY DAD WAS NEVER MUCH of a disciplinarian. He never told us not to do anything, because he figured, why put ideas into our heads? It was infuriating, like being in jail. So we never did anything . We had no idea what we were missing, really.
And we had absolutely no idea that my dad had been a bit of a hell-raiser in his youth at St. Gregory’s. We never heard any of these stories, because my aunt, who knew them all, lived in the convent as a Carmelite nun, with a vow of silence. Until I was seventeen, I’d only seen her during visiting hours at the convent, in full habit, talking through a screen like in old prison movies. After twenty-five years as a Carmelite, she changed vocations and became a Dominican, which meant she could now do counseling for hospital patients and wore groovy white pantsuits instead of a habit. She also came to visit more, and told us stories of my dad’s wild youth. We were appalled to learn how much trouble we had missed out on; maybe the secret of parenting is having your big sister take a vow of silence.
He gave us permission to take a day off from school whenever we wanted, with the result that none of us ever took a day off from school. His way of parenting my sisters and me was to compliment us for things we weren’t even doing, but his compliments made us want to start doing them. If he was annoyed by my impatience, he would compliment me on my patience. Somehow that would instinctively make me strive to be more patient. Why? I don’t know. Things that come so torturously to me are a breeze for him.
My dad assumes the best in people. It can be maddening. He voted for Gerald Ford for president in 1976, even though he was a Democrat. Why? Because 1) he felt bad for Ford, 2) he knew Massachusetts was going Democrat anyway, and 3) he didn’t want Ford to be completely humiliated in the popular vote. He still thinks Ford did the right thing by pardoning Nixon. We argue about this every couple of years. My dad says it was important for Ford to pardon everybody and put all that trouble behind us. When I point out that this is not what happened—Nixon was the
On the drive home, when I asked my dad what “Best Homemade Car” meant, he just laughed. “It means you were the only kid who did the car himself. Most of those kids weren’t even allowed to touch their cars.”
My dad’s a good sport, always up for an adventure, letting his kids talk our easily-talked-into-things dad into things. When I started reading books, he’d bring me books like Tom Sawyer , and when I started singing along to the radio, he brought me records like “American Pie.” When he was forty, working in a bank, he decided to go to law school at night, but he still coached my sisters’ basketball teams. (How did he do that? It’d be pointless to ask him. Maybe he doesn’t even know.)
He eventually quit his day job and started practicing law on his own when he was fifty. He has worked hard to make his life happen, but he doesn’t acknowledge any stress or strain about it at all. He has never worried about whether things will work out. He’s easy. He likes his habits—listening to the radio, drinking coffee, pronouncing the word California wrong (he calls it “Califonia.” Why? Nobody knows), calling blue jeans “dungies,” and speaking in his unreconstructed accent. When he was in the army, he went to Mass once and gave the responses in Latin, like everybody did back then. When the service was over, the chaplain asked, “So what part of Boston are you from?” That’s right: My dad’s Boston accent could make a man wince even when my dad was speaking Latin.
MY DAD WAS NEVER MUCH of a disciplinarian. He never told us not to do anything, because he figured, why put ideas into our heads? It was infuriating, like being in jail. So we never did anything . We had no idea what we were missing, really.
And we had absolutely no idea that my dad had been a bit of a hell-raiser in his youth at St. Gregory’s. We never heard any of these stories, because my aunt, who knew them all, lived in the convent as a Carmelite nun, with a vow of silence. Until I was seventeen, I’d only seen her during visiting hours at the convent, in full habit, talking through a screen like in old prison movies. After twenty-five years as a Carmelite, she changed vocations and became a Dominican, which meant she could now do counseling for hospital patients and wore groovy white pantsuits instead of a habit. She also came to visit more, and told us stories of my dad’s wild youth. We were appalled to learn how much trouble we had missed out on; maybe the secret of parenting is having your big sister take a vow of silence.
He gave us permission to take a day off from school whenever we wanted, with the result that none of us ever took a day off from school. His way of parenting my sisters and me was to compliment us for things we weren’t even doing, but his compliments made us want to start doing them. If he was annoyed by my impatience, he would compliment me on my patience. Somehow that would instinctively make me strive to be more patient. Why? I don’t know. Things that come so torturously to me are a breeze for him.
My dad assumes the best in people. It can be maddening. He voted for Gerald Ford for president in 1976, even though he was a Democrat. Why? Because 1) he felt bad for Ford, 2) he knew Massachusetts was going Democrat anyway, and 3) he didn’t want Ford to be completely humiliated in the popular vote. He still thinks Ford did the right thing by pardoning Nixon. We argue about this every couple of years. My dad says it was important for Ford to pardon everybody and put all that trouble behind us. When I point out that this is not what happened—Nixon was the
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