vanessa: ideas and images: February 2018

So many people would smile and say, “Your father is a character!”, or “Your dad is something else!” and I’d reply “Welcome to my world”.

Dad was something else.

He was cool and confident. He wasn't merely stuck in his ways, he was cemented. He was religious, fiercely independent, strongly opinionated, a right fighter, paternalistic, legalistic, chauvinistic, a little narcissistic, a bit of a gossip, and sexist.

Understandably, he was fiercely pro-Black (in a way that only a Black man born in the Deep South in the mid 20's could be).

He was clever, sarcastic; an enthusiastic, braggadocious winner, a sore, rematch-seeking loser, and a little homophobic.

The TV was providing background noise while I was cooking one day, and "Ellen" was on. I could hear his walker dragging across the foyer floor. He stopped. “She sure gives a whole lot to a lot of people, don't she? Just like Oprah. You know she’s queer, right?”

“Uh...Yes”, I answered.

He picked up the remote and clicked until Anderson Cooper’s talking head appeared on the screen. “That’s better. The news. You need to know what’s going on in the world”.

I stifled my laughter and left the kitchen. I didn’t want him to ask me what was so funny--and I wasn’t trying to out Anderson, either.

Dad needed to know what was going on everywhere-- the world, nation, state and citywide, on his street, and most of all in his family.

He had no qualms about asking personal questions. "How much money you got in your account?"

He figured family should be able to talk about anything.

Everything was his business.

Sometimes, he'd sit at the kitchen table like a sentry, and, every now and then, his presence paid off. Some little kid would not be getting bullied that day, or someone would be sorry they chose a spot in front of his house to throw litter.

When Mark Lewis would come to take care of the lawn, Dad would shuffle himself to the window. “Lemme see what Mark's doing out here”.

Dad wasn’t going to whack a single weed, but he just had to give Mark some instruction, or tell him what to purchase at Home Depot. It made him feel as if he was still in charge, and Mark always graciously obliged.

Dad was a survivor. When the U.S.S. Bennington exploded he was on board. When the U.S.S. Edisto was breaking treacherous ice in Antarctica, he was on board.

When a white man told him he would shoot him if he didn't stop making waves in the water, because it “scared the fish”, he figured out how to move that oar just right.

He was an entrepreneur, and a consistent provider. He always had a job. He sacrificed and honored his obligations.
I don't ever remember pastel-colored utility envelopes arriving in the mail, or "Did you forget?" notices.

He was hard-working, generous to a fault, responsible, a man of his word, and timely (Oh, my God). He would say, “You never have to make an excuse for being on time. If the meeting starts at 9:00 and you show up at 9:00, you’re late”.

My Dad was a man’s man. Men and women had very strict roles according to him.

When Deacon Leroy Williams would finish cutting his hair, and then to my delight, plug in the vacuum cleaner, Dad would have a fit.

“Man, whatchu doing? Vanessa will get that!” Deac would say, “Vanessa didn’t put this hair on the floor, Man, I did!”

With Dad, there were absolutes. Things were black or white. There was no grey area. Times had changed, but he hadn't.

In his eyes, there were things that husbands and wives were obligated to do. Chivalry, duty, and vows mattered.

When my mother was sick, he declared it was his job to take her to her chemotherapy treatments, although it baffled him that she could be treated at Walter Reed, but he--the veteran--couldn't be.

“She ain't never served in the military nowhere! What's that all about?"

She was his wife, and his responsibility.

“Nobody will be able to say I didn’t do what I was supposed to do”.

Mommy never paid the mortgage, cut grass, pumped gas, shoveled snow, or buffed a floor unless she wanted to.

My Dad was sharp and clean. He’d put on a dress shirt to go to a picnic. I was shocked when he would agree to wear the jeans I’d laid out for him to wear on outings he would take with Rev. Wilson, Mr. Lacy Brown, or Deacon Scott. “Dungarees?", he'd say with a frown. These are dungarees! That’s what we wore to play in, or work in the fields! That’s what people wore if they couldn’t afford no other clothes! Lord, if I could have gone to school looking like some of these kids today, I would’a had a PhD!"

When it came to who was going to pick him up and bring him home from church, he was adamant that Deacon Leonard Thompson do it. He was in no mood for scandal or the appearance of impropriety. Even when Dad was a fall risk, the Thompsons were faithful. “Man, don’t you leave me with nobody else! You my ride".

On those rare occasions when Leonard couldn’t do it, Deacon Hanesborough or another deacon or minister were proper stand-ins. Dad wasn't interested in taking any detours between church and home. "I have a reputation!"

Dad liked order, and hated clutter. He didn't understand a nasty, messy woman, or a lazy man. He couldn’t keep the house like he and Mom always had in the past, but that didn’t mean he didn’t want it done.

“You got all your mama’s ways,” he told me one day. "Ummm. Thank you?" I replied.

"Yes indeed", he said. "You always wiping something". I told him that it was his fault.

“You said to take care of what belongs to someone else as if it was your own, didn’t you?" I asked.

"Yeah. I guess I said that, but I mean, you can sit down some time."

He was a leader. He didn't care if his was the only dissenting voice in a matter. If he made a recommendation, he figured it should stick. If he didn’t think you were qualified, he made no secret of it. "Eeeeeverybody got a title. Eeeeverybody want to see their name. Title don't mean nothing if you're not doing the work. People can see who's working and who's just talking about it. They say they want the job, but when they get it, they want to revolutionize it; complain it's too hard; do something half-way; watch other people work, then take all the credit." He'd muse about his tenure as a federal protective officer as if he still had the job. "Every now and then, I'd find a man sleeping on the job. I'd put him in the street! "Man, you're not being paid to sleep! Too many people just wanna be seen. Ain't nobody fooled. People just fooling themselves. They say they're working but they’re not doing nothing”.

Aging wasn’t graceful for him. He was shocked that he lived so long, and reached 90, and then 91. Disability was like a crime. “I got it”;

“I’m not an invalid”; “Don’t treat me like a baby”.

He felt he should be deciding, telling, directing, ordering, instructing, coordinating, appointing, or supervising. He detested feeling inadequate or weak.

Not being able to drive was really tough on him. He considered the loss of that skill "suffering".

We took UBER and Lyft everywhere, and it was clear that technology was a mystery to him.

“You know these people? I don’t remember you paying anybody. I pay my way”.

He would often tell people, “She always getting in cars with strange men; got me in there.”

At first, I was highly offended, then it occurred to me, to a person born in 1926, that’s exactly what I was doing.

Once he got the hang of it, you would have thought he had the app and I was riding with him. "Yeah. I'm gonna get me one of them "Urbers".

Beginning in 2005, the Lord graciously gave me four tries to learn the lessons I needed to in order to serve him; to learn that he was not likely to change, so my responses to him had to drastically adjust.

I had to try and try at caregiving before it occurred to me why the mean-spirited, stubborn, abrasive old guy was being so. He had no filter at all, and doled out compliments sparingly.

Had I not taken an old friend’s advice to “Stop running and confront”, my little feelings would have been hurt every day, because he had some critique about everything--and someone was always in his ear accusing and maligning me; looking for anything to use to drive a wedge between us. That's when I learned to document everything--and I mean everything. He may have forgotten a thing, but I surely wouldn't.

My smartphone has served me well.

I still haven’t found that place in the Bible where it says "When you reach a certain age, you can say whatever you want, whenever, and however you want", but old people must have penciled that in.

I suppose many feel they don’t have much time, and no inclination to tiptoe around what they believe is urgent information that others need to know.

“What’s wrong with your hair? You ain't going nowhere with me looking like that”. or “This spaghetti is good, but next time, put some dried shrimp in it". or "I didn't enjoy that. That was dry. I don't know what they did to it. We should've gone to Accokeek Seafood like we started to". (He loved Accokeek Seafood, and longed for their catfish (fried hard) for months).

He said I was too quiet; that I held things in that I should say, and just let the chips fall. “You need to speak up”.

"Well Dad, what about Isaiah?"

"What about him?"

Well, he said Jesus was persecuted and mistreated and never said a mumbling word".

“Yeah. I know what it says. I read it. But you not Jesus”.

I had to tap into his sense of humor. When he was laughing with you, or at Barney Fife, Jim Anderson, Ray Barone, Sinbad, Steve Harvey, or any incarnation of Tyler Perry, it was infectious. Every time Steve appeared on TV he'd say, "My man! Look, he got on another new suit! I think I need that tie."

Dad was saddened by Bill Cosby's troubles, but no one made him laugh like Bill Cosby. He loved stand-up comedians. He had Sandy Baron, Moms Mabley and Pigmeat Markham LPs (that I wasn't supposed to hear). It was his custom to find something funny to laugh at before falling asleep. Usually, it was several episodes of "Everybody Loves Raymond".

Dad could be stern. For a long time, I didn’t understand that bark. His bite was long gone, but he could say stuff that made me forget there was an AARP card in my wallet.

The dementia I didn’t understand, at first, caused him to tell people he didn’t even know why I was there, and then on rare occasions, he’d abandon his bravado and say how relieved he was that he wasn’t alone. He was no longer a vault. If you told him anything in confidence, or if he gave you something, it was repeated and broadcast often. If you came to him for advice, you shouldn’t look for consent or sugarcoating. If you didn’t like what he said, well, too bad. You shouldn't have asked him.

Any hurt or offense disappeared when I made the effort to see things from his perspective. He needed help, but it took a while before he wanted or embraced it. He had been everywhere, and had done everything on his own terms, and with his own strength.
When a person is used to doing for themselves, choosing, declaring, assigning, and dictating, they don’t take lightly to some able-bodied person “taking over”.

I learned that my presence was a threat to his carefully crafted “King-of-the-Castle-Master-of-My-Domain-Father-Knows-Best” life.

I was reminded often, early on, whose house it was, but the more I demonstrated respect and care for it, the more he began to say "your", "we", "our", and "us".

He still had an aversion to help, though--and I had the nerve to be a girl. No girl was supposed to be leading him, handling him, helping him up, or deciding what he should wear, eat or drink.

His room, office, and his bathroom were his lair, and it was a long time before he was truly comfortable with me entering to do anything. He had a proper way to do everything from folding shirts, and rolling socks, to lining up toiletries. He knew where he had placed everything--even things he hadn't seen in years.

"Go out there in the garage, look on that shelf in the corner on the right side, and there should be a Phillips screwdriver."

That screwdriver would be right where he said it was.

I thought I was a caregiver, but he saw a child invading his privacy; getting into grown folks business; commandeering his ship, but he slowly mellowed, and allowed me to assist. "Read this; write that; explain what this says; take care of that stuff for me".

When I was growing up, I didn’t know Dad had shoulders, knees, or a back. When he stepped out of his room, he was fully dressed. Illnesses meant I had to figure out a way to give him all the dignity and privacy he required and demanded. I had to learn how helping him emasculated and frustrated him.

When his urologist, Dr. Barakat insisted on showing me how to clean the skin near the tube that had been placed in Dad's stomach, and began to throw back the sheet, I turned my head, and shut my eyes. Dad shouted, "Say Doc! Hold up! That's my daughter, not my wife!"

At home, Dad would tell me when he was ready for me to come in his room and change a dressing. He made sure I saw no more than I needed to, and I appreciated avoiding the blindness that was sure to strike me.
It was difficult for him to say “thank you” to someone who he felt wasn’t supposed to assist him. He felt he should be assisting me.

“Don’t you need something?”

He eventually resigned that help wasn’t such a bad thing. He said “Thank you. Child” as if he had been practicing.

In spite of what others said or did, or even what he said, he learned I wasn’t some spawn of Satan who sneaked in, without cause, to steal his stuff and topple his kingdom. He was ill. He wanted to be at home. He couldn't live alone.

Through that very Bible he taught from so long and so well, he reminded himself that I was there to honor him, and that directive came with no exceptions or loop holes.

I told him. "You messed around and taught me about Jesus. You should have never showed me that Book.”

Every Sunday school lesson I planned and typed for him was an undercover conversation with him. Through them, I had a chance to say what I’m not sure he would have received from a mere girl. Then he took that honoring to an extreme. When a CNA came to help in the mornings for a few weeks, he told her to sit down because he didn’t need her to do anything. “My daughter will do it”. He’d say it with such confidence that I would just shake my head. It’s true. You teach people how to treat you, and he came to learn that he was, as always, right. I WOULD do it.

I’d been his caregiver long enough to know exactly how he wanted things done.

Dad wasn’t always the easiest guy to get along with, and I slipped into "heartily as unto the Lord" mode long ago. I knew how well the elderly fared and healed in their own environments. There were statistics to back it up. He’d always gotten better before, and that eclipsed any difficulty I faced. When that rapier wit would return, I knew it was time to pack up and go back home. This time, however, he went home.

I'd had such hope when he stood up in December with the help of Tammy, his physical therapist. I could just see him with a new prosthetic leg, strutting into church. God had other plans, though, and there will be a new leg-- better than anything modern technology could create.

He took those deep, short breaths last Tuesday afternoon, and that feisty spirit was on its way. He died on his own terms. Peacefully. With dignity. He slept away. He was ready. “Everybody says they want to see Jesus, but nobody wants to die!” he’d say. I don’t know anyone on Earth who was more ready to die than he was.

What I am eternally grateful to the Lord for, however, was that He reassured my dad that all was well. The finished work of Calvary and dad's acceptance of it was enough. He didn’t have to work or behave his way into the kingdom. After years of studying and teaching others, I was stunned to learn that Dad had not been 100% sure of the faithfulness or ability of God to forgive him. He acknowledged the holiness of God, and began to look back on his life, and dwell on chapters of which he was not proud. It grieved him. It was why he was adamant about paying his tithes, and "rebuking the devourer". He figured if he did his small part, God would provide. For him it was like penance. “I ain’t gonna rob God. I figured I cheated the Lord enough when I was in the street. I figure I owe him that much.”

Our performance-based religion, with all of our rules, traditions, and bylaws can be a real stumblingblock to an authentic relationship with God. Dad had some anxiety, and still felt there was something, some lifestyle he had to master in order to be acceptable and good enough to a God who had been so good to him. He was of that generation that highlighted The Big Four of the Sin Hall of Fame—sex, drugs, smoking, and alcohol. If you weren’t indulging in those, you could boast about it, and you were good with Jesus, but that kind of thinking omitted the other things that God hates just as much.

Dad was adamant about seeing Jesus, though, and he prayed constantly, fervently, out loud, and in tears. He lamented those who led him astray as a child. He wanted to see his mother and Grampa Gunny. “I knew they loved me” he would say. His private devotional time revealed a vulnerable side I'd rarely experienced.

In spite of his diligent study, he was plagued by the thought that there was something he’d done, and forgotten to mention in his prayers, that in his mind, even God wouldn’t have the authority to forget. That’s why Dad was so hard on everyone—young men in particular. He didn't want anyone to repeat his mistakes. He figured that other people's experiences could be the best teachers, too. It was why he was always correcting, and warning, and discerning error; why he spirited his two youngest sisters away from the perceived evils and lack of opportunity in the South. It was why he ruled his daughters with an iron fist; why we couldn’t go out on dates unless we went with close family friends; why we “had to get that piece of paper. "A degree says you have potential. It puts you in a better position than someone who has experience”.

He yearned for grace, and learned that the mercy you show is the mercy you'll receive. He was determined to “make it in” and he preached repentance. Like everyone else on Earth, he’d fallen short. It was why he was so tough on his friends; why he was particular about what and who he endorsed, and where he went; why he hoped that deacons and preachers would be accountable, responsible, faithful, knowledgeable, strong, and efficient—and dress the part, and not mangle or misuse the scriptures, screw up a prayer, or butcher a hymn.

One day he stumbled upon 1 John 1:9. That revelation gave him so much joy. It was like a weight was lifted. He happily repeated his account of the visitation of the Holy Ghost to everyone who called or visited. He said The Spirit asked him when he thought he should get ready to die. The encounter concluded with his assurance of his salvation, and determination to be ready, because he knew death was sure. "You can't park here", he'd quip.

I am so glad I had every conversation with my dad that I wanted and needed to have; I asked every question; learned more about him, his upbringing, his ideals, travels, thoughts, secrets, prejudices, and opinions. In order to understand his disposition and be less fearful and anxious, and more compassionate, those talks (and lectures) were necessary. In the end, to earn his respect, confidence, and a word of appreciation was priceless. “I just want to say thank you for everything you’ve done for me” he said.

I don’t know who needed that approval more—my 7 year-old self or my 57 year-old self, but I took it gladly. “You alright with me" he said. People are gonna hate you. I don’t know why, but you gotta speak up”.

In spite of everything the enemy used others to do: the lies, gossip, accusations, and innuendo; in spite of every attempt to make me become discouraged and quit, I'm glad I didn't. I'm glad I kept my promise to him. He's free now, and in a way, so am I.

No, Dad, I’m not going to say “absent from the body, present with the Lord”, because I know you said the Bible doesn’t say that…and I’m not going to say you’re looking down on me, because you said the dead know nothing. "If everybody is picking flowers, and singing songs, playing golf, and watching graduations, who’s gonna get up when Jesus comes back?" he'd complain.

What I will say, is that I know he did his very best with the tools he had. Hurt and broken people often do hurt people, but it's amazing to be gifted the time and grace to make amends. To be able to hold the hand that once inflicted pain, is a miracle.

Dad will not soon be forgotten. Everyone he ever met has a story about the captain, the deacon, the chairman, the association president, and we could spend all day swapping those stories.

Because of him, my skin is thicker, my fear of confrontation is disappearing, and I’ve found my voice. "Know your supervisor" he’d always say. "You are not a twin. Don’t just go along to get along. Don't be a follower. Do the right thing no matter who else is not doing it. You don’t have to explain nothing to people you don’t work for. Remember who you work for".

I will Dad.