MY FATHER: MY OLD MAN
by Charlie Steel

I want to tell you about my old man. Lately I have been thinking about him a lot and how as a kid I shortchanged him. I didn't give him any credit at all for having brains or common sense or a style of life that meant something. Me, I just figured if you couldn't have it all, live high, fast and mighty, then life just wasn't worth living. It was a sucker who took it slow, easy and careful, and my old man, I thought, was the biggest sucker of them all. He would get up at five in the morning, work a 12 hour day using his muscles, come home all tired out, hit the sack early and start up the next morning doing it all over again - day after day - year after year. It didn't make any sense to me, this sucker's life, and I wasn't going to do it.

My old man was short: about five foot seven inches and on the slim side. He had fine sandy hair, powder blue eyes, an aquiline forehead, a straight nose and firm chin. Handsome would have fit the description. Below the belly he was slim, but above his belt was a huge muscled chest. His shoulders were wide and his biceps bulged from heavy lifting and from work he did as a roustabout in the oilfields. Roustabout meant he did any and all kinds of work that the oil company required. He set to it with a vengeance, outworking any man on the crew.

My old man himself drove the heavy equipment to the sites, set up the pumping jack and greasy derrick, hoisted and fitted the heavy cable onto the giant pulley and then set up the massive steel jack onto the old-fashioned drilling machine. Day and night he would drill for oil: work the rig, sharpen the red hot bit with a sledgehammer, put it back in the hole for the steel cable to take back down only to pump up and down on the giant two-stroke engine as it punched a 3000 or more foot hole into the earth.

Going hot and heavy, waiting for a well to come in, my old man often would not come home but instead stayed all night near the well and caught catnaps on a small cot in the doghouse where drilling equipment was stored. The day or month of the year didn't make any difference to my old man. Whether it was winter, spring, summer or fall, work was work and money was money. He worked hard six or seven days a week. Only one thing would keep him from work - church. He never missed an hour of church on Sunday morning, no matter where he was.

My old man didn't drill very many dry holes and, when he discovered oil, he laid the pipe, capped her and attached a pumping jack, pump house and a tank to catch that precious black liquid. Everyday, for over 40 years, at the end of his shift he washed himself off from a 55 gallon gasoline drum using a wet red rag soaked in the stuff. The hazards not even considered. And, every night he came home reeking of gasoline, crude oil, grease and sweat.

"That's the smell of money, sonny!" He would tell me as a kid. All I could think was that I hoped no one else would smell him and I wondered why my old man couldn't get a decent job and be like other kids dads.

"Chuckie Boy!" said my father when I was very young and I was walking beside him from our house on the corner to grandma's big old house. "It hurts me to see my mother like this. When I was your age she was so beautiful - in fact, the most beautiful woman I ever saw - and so full of life and sweet. Now she is a sick old woman. Remember this, son, none of us live forever. We have to make the best out of this life while we can. You hear me, son?"

"Yes, Daddy, but you're old, too!"

"Oh, yeah?" he laughed. "I bet I can race you to grandma's house right now - and beat you, too!"

I was amazed that my old man easily beat me without even trying. After that we raced each time we went visiting grandma. In all those years, until I was 10 and grandmother died, I never beat my father in a foot race. He was all muscles and could run like the wind.

To this moment I remember certain days and months of my early youth that passed as clearly as I remember the things I did this morning, in some cases, even more clearly. My mantra back then was, 'Daddy, will you take me fishing?' For my dad had made the mistake of taking me both stream trout fishing and lake fishing in a small rowboat. We lived in Michigan, and for many months into spring, summer and fall, fishing was available to us. Even in the winter, one could drive a car over the ice and fish in a hole cut deep into the thick substance. It went like this nearly every day from the age of four until I gave up on my dad. That was when I turned 12.

I would watch for the car to come home. He arrived at different times, but nearly always by five or six o'clock in the evening. I would run to the car. He would get out wearing his changed clothes but still reeking of gasoline, oil and sweat. A blanket would be spread over the seat to catch the odors from his clothes. He wore blue jeans or khaki work clothes, and on his feet were steel-toed boots. As he opened the door of that chocolate brown Ford, our ritual would begin.

"How are you, Chuckie boy?" he asked while thumping me on the back with his powerful hand.

"Okay, Daddy. How was your day?"

"Just fine. It's always fine when one puts in a good day. Smell that smell, son?" He slid his hand in front of my face.

I wrinkled my nose at the sour odor.

"Well, that's the smell of money and that's exactly what your father earned. Enough to pay the bills and the grocer. Who wouldn't be proud of that?"

"Uh-huh," I mumbled.

"Does your mother have supper on the table?"

"Yes, Daddy. She's made meatloaf with mashed potatoes and gravy and baked beans - and sweet rice in milk with raisons for dessert!"

"Well now, isn't that just fine! Suppose we go wash up and sit down to eat. I'm hungry!"

"You're always hungry, Daddy!"

"Well yes, son, if you worked like I do, you would be hungry too!"

"Daddy?"

"Yes, son?

"If you're not too tired after supper, can we go fishing?

"Chucky boy, are you going to ask me that question every day of my life?"

"Yes, Daddy. You promised, some time this week you would take me fishing."

"I worked 12 hours today, son. No, not tonight, I'm too tired."

"Then tomorrow, Daddy? I'll have everything ready: the worms, the poles, the tackle and the net."

"Now, I'm not promising, son; but maybe tomorrow we can go. Maybe. Now you leave me alone with asking. There's only so much patience a grown man can have."

"Yes, Daddy, but you said we could go this week, and it's almost the end of the week now."

"You make me tired, son. We'll see, now let's go inside and wash up for dinner."

And so went the ritual with my old man - day after day - year after year.

Be sure to look for the continuation in next month's issue.

Those interested in reading more about Charlie Steel's work may visit www.condorpublishinginc.com.