At my grandma’s funeral, years ago, the priest said something that stuck with me. And I don’t usually go for this sort of thing. But he talked about the work, the drudgery, of raising kids: bedtimes, bathtimes, breakfast and out the door to school. And again and again. And, he said, we don’t consider it heroic because it’s just expected of a parent. But it is heroic.
My dad was a hero. He worked. A lot. For us. He worked a couple decades at a job he hated. He worked through late shifts, schedule changes, transfers and as much overtime as he could gobble up.
And he always had a second job on top of that. Some of them were cool. He worked at Bellerose Lanes bowling alley. That was fun for me. I wound up joining a youth league. Still have never scored a turkey. He was also an ice cream man! That was a special thrill. However old I was – 9? 11? – to be handling the cash and handing out the treats to the customers.
And, of course, he drove for car services while there was still money in it. When Uber destroyed that business, he finally retired for good from all work.
When I say he hated his job, I mean that he hated the bosses, the bureaucracy, the reassignments and shift changes. He loved issuing tickets. Many times I’d be driving with him and he’d notice, “That’s not a legal parking spot,” clearly itching for his ticket book.
Dad was famous for noticing things while driving. I’m going to embarrass mom with this story: One time we were driving as a family on the BQE. I think we were going to Jersey. Apropos of nothing my dad points down to Brooklyn below and goes, “You see that Dunkin Donuts? I took the biggest dump there the other day!” Which got us kids laughing, particularly when mom shouted, “ROBERT! Why do you think we want to know this?!”
Dad had an eagle eye for garage sales. He was a collector. He would collect ridiculous things that he was convinced were “collector’s items,” like Beanie Babies and Happy Meal toys. Mom’s still going to be finding hidden little collections every time she cleans out a closet.
He would also collect for you. Not just family, but neighbors and acquaintances. He was very generous like that. “Does your friend still collect Nancy Drew books? Does she have #27?”
At one point I had, like, three copies of Johnny Cash at San Quentin, four Toys in the Attic and probably six copies of the Doors’ Soft Parade (which is, probably, their worst record; and that’s saying something). I didn’t want to tell him to stop, because he enjoys the hunt and he would find some real prizes. I just finally told him, don’t pay more than a dollar for any record.
As my kids started developing their own taste in music, I put Dad to work filling out gaps in my collection. Bernadette loves “girl singers,” and here I was with just Blondie’s Greatest Hits. I remember once, my parents came over on a Friday (which they did every week from when we brought Audrey home until the pandemic lockdown) and I told my Dad, “Hey, if you find any Pretenders at a garage sale, pick it up.” The next day, Saturday (prime garage saling), I get a call from his cell, “Hello, son. So, uh, Pretenders? A girl and three guys? I got ya.”
Of course, Dad’s greatest collection was his Mets museum. Baseball cards, bobbleheads, yearbooks, thirty year old cans of RC Cola. We went through some of it on Sunday. The girls took their pick of plush E.T. and Barbie dolls dressed in Mets jerseys, Mets garden gnomes, Mets pins. It was a nice way of saying goodbye. And every time we watch a game, we’ll think of him. And just you watch: Dad was such a long-suffering Mets fan that just you watch and this be the year that they make it all the way to the Series and win the thing.
Dad was also a very proud parent. He didn’t understand all of my weird stuff. Another masters degree and college titles that aren’t professor and magazine articles that pay but not that much. “This book, it’s available in stores?” Who reads it? Hell if I know! But he was proud that I got out there. And print is print. And it’s always nice to be in print. Getting in the Sunday Daily News, in many ways a more impressive accomplishment. You see that on your neighbors’ front steps! He had a copy in the hospital.
He didn’t totally understand my politics, which in any “both sides” debate inevitably finds a third, fourth and fifth side to champion instead. But he supported me. I remember that he voted for Grandpa Al Lewis in 1998 to help the Green party get a ballot line. “If you’re for him, that makes sense to me.” Dad wasn’t a low information voter, per se. He just didn’t want to dwell on politics, but he was guided by a good heart. I also remember him offering up–unsolicited–his reason for voting for Hillary Clinton in 2000, an election in which pollsters were worried about middle-aged white guys like him. “I figure it’s about time we give a woman a chance.”
The thing that I’m proudest of, the thing that probably gave him the most joy in his last decade, was making him a grandpa. And Audrey and Bernadette loved their Grandpa Bob, or, as baby Audrey used to imitate my mom, “ROBERT!”