Well, my Dad called me about an hour ago. I had not talked to him in over a month. He told me today he'd lost my number. Excuse me? Whatever. Kinda typical. Anyway, we were talking about my Mom and I made a comment that if she wanted to see me she was going to have to fly home. Because my Father is a dink and cannot have a convo NOT on speaker phone (GOD I HATE THAT SHIT!!), my Stepmother heard what I'd said and spoke up letting me know she was detecting an attitude problem. To which I said that if my Mom wants to see me she can come home and also see her friends and then promptly ended the conversation. Fathers Day comes with mixed emotions every year, because my family dynamics is all fuckered up (some of you may remember from past posts why) but this year especially, with the recent loss of a loved and adored family member, will be a tough one. I know we have Dads here and to them, Happy Father's Day. And to any Grads, congrats and enjoy this time, it is the calm before the storm. Let's try a feel good start to the WDT. What was the best lesson your most prominent parental unit (or unit-like person) ever taught you?
My dad is Red Foreman except he has hair and is a bit chubby. I heard the following growing up ad nauseum: -"The Universe doesn't give a shit about you or your problems" -"If you don't study and/or work hard you're going to be working at McDonalds." -"Stop fucking *WITH* the neighbors cat." Juice Edit: God dammit.
My dad, who was my stepdad before he formally adopted me, really encouraged me to do well in school and be independent and self-sufficient. I think it worked for the most part. Maybe I never change my own oil like he taught me, but I do understand the principle of why I should know how. Honestly I wish I could be more like him in conveying this to my own kid. It's funny, yesterday an old school friend of mine posted a picture on my FB wall of a photograph of my parents he found in his sister's album. I tagged my parents and my dad said hi, and then my friend said this to him: It made me laugh, both because I had zero memory of this and because it is so him.
I would have to say that my complete intolerance for other people's bullshit is trait I definitely picked up from my dad. This isn't always a good thing though because he tends to write people off and burn all contact with people he feels are hypocrites or annoyingly flawed in any way. And it definitely translates to family members. So we both hate my mother's side of the family pretty equally. This may sound okay but he has a very unforgiving personality and some of that has rubbed off. Being highly critical of others can be a good thing as far as making smart decisions is concerned. But being that way to the point he is makes for a noticeable lack of friends. My complete intolerance for alcohol comes from him as well. I am such a lightweight, just like him, its not even funny. Its not even fun. I have to generally stop at 2 beers if I plan on driving.
Work. My dad, above all, has taught me how to work, and keep working, and then work some more. This woman and her blatherings tho...are just too much.
I miss my father terribly when Father's day rolls around. Mostly, he taught me so many lessons simply by living out all that he believed. He was a genuinely good man, generous and humble, slow to anger, and very good a promoting peace or compromise when others could not. Though he took all the important things seriously, like being a good dad and husband, and being good at his job, he had a terrific sense of humor. He was the one always guilty of over laughing - like chuckle, chuckle <pause> hA! - in just the right way, so that whoever delivered the joke really felt good. He had a saying that was sort of just a throwaway, t-shirt phrase, but it always stuck with me (and I still use it) because it embodied his love of life, nay just enjoying life. "You're only young once. But, you can be immature forever." Here's to good dads.
The gist of what she wrote is "I don't have a rocking body and I don't want my husband to see yours." But, the title of her post is "My husband doesn't need to see your boobs." But, in the text she writes ". . . I want to tell you that I don’t need my husband to see your boobs." Those are two totally different things. The second one is what she's saying, but the title is just wrong. Her husband definitely needs to see your boobs. In fact, it would not surprise me if her husband's inbox suddenly gets filled with pictures of boobs. Not wanting her husband to see other girls boobs is probably a sentiment that is shared by a lot of wives, whether they have a rocking body or not. But, emasculating her husband by posting what he needs in the title of the article is dumb. He can speak for himself. And, if he did, he would surely say, "I would like you to know that I want to see my wife's boobs. And, I also need to see your boobs."
That whole blog is filled with the rantings of an insecure woman. It's sad that she uses the royal WE in most of it, and perpetuates the idea that all women feel this way.
Treat other people the way you want to be treated. Basic respect. Oh yeah, that too... one of his favorite lines is "Work hard and if in doubt, work harder."
These people are obviously Christians because I used to be in that community and was married to one, and I can tell you that the husband is indeed distressed by it. He is distressed because it triggers sexual thoughts of someone other than his wife, which is a sin, and he does not wish to sin. So what he is doing is just trying to avoid it whenever he can. Kind of like how people on a diet don't keep chips and ice cream in the house. I think that is perfectly fine if it is part of his belief system. What she's doing - and then tries to backpedal - is insecure, judgmental, blame-shifting garbage, and she does not really appreciate what she has in a man who is willing to go that far for his beliefs and his marriage.
It's funny because my dad's slant towards over working never rubbed off on his three sons. We are all slovenly pigs who couldn't string together a 40 hour week if we tried. Well my older brother puts in tons of hours but his work demands it and if he could make the same pay doing much less (who wouldn't) he'd take it. My dad would put in 60 hours because he liked work, volunteered for every Saturday, worked 3rd shift because it pad better, had the most over time hours of anyone in his building at GE. He was also a semi neat freak which none of us took on. I gotta go to work now I can be getting all misty eyed.
Aside from yelling at me for apparently sexually abusing a cat, my dad is a great guy. Despite his tough love attitude when I was growing up, he turned into a softy over the years. I have zero issues with how him or my mother raised us.
My pops an amazing man. He was given nothing and became very successful. He's always been type A, a hard worker and intelligent, I guess thats what allowed him to succeed. Currently he is a high level exec for a big pharma everyone loves to hate on. I have an amazing relationship with him, we talk almost every day. He's always been there for me and while he was never big on speeches, he was always there when it mattered. I don't have any sayings I take with me, I take moments I've had with him.
My dad is the best person I know. He was viciously beaten by his WWII paratrooper-turned alcoholic mailman father daily, and never once directed that horror at me ever. He's just a very kind and likeable person. He went back to college in his 40's right before the tech boom to become an IT specialist and a couple years later was a globe-trotting software consultant. I wish he'd retire but he has an easy job now, he works right across the street from my own work, running a storage rental property. He is an extremely skillfull artist, too. He can paint breathtaking scenery with Bob Ross-esque skill. Because of him I can draw really well too but I don't have a fraction of his talent.