A Brief History of Dad

My dad grew up as close to nature as one can without being born a lady bug or an acorn. He was pretty much left to run wild. My grandfather was 60 years old, when he was born and my grandmother was 45. His youngest sibling was 17 years old and to top it off...he was the only male. Over the years I have heard bits and pieces of my dad's early life. Once while walking through the old house (long since burned to the ground) with him, he showed me where his bed use to be and how he was afraid to go to sleep because one of the giant rats that lived in the attic might come down and bite him. He also told me how his sisters treated him like he was a doll and tried to dress him up like a girl. This actually explains allot, you can not meet a more macho man than my father. He is not one that is in touch with his feminine side. At ten years old, he was known as the Teasley Branch Kid, and use to walk the local woods with a loaded shotgun. Retired Reverend Hatfield of the First Baptist Church of Alpharetta will back me up on that one. My dad was just a little kid when the Reverend came to town and my dad was one of the first people that he met.

In addition to trying to assert his manhood, he had to deal with a mother suffering from severe depression. She had been going slowly blind since she was a young girl and probably suffered from postpartum depression. She tried to kill herself numerous times with pills and liked to threaten the whole family with the future possibility of it. My dad has told me how he remembers her screaming “I want to die” until he just became numb of it. People that really want to kill themselves do it. Don’t pull the old “I am going to kill myself” routine on my father; he will go get a gun to help.

My dad’s father, also named Gordon, was an elderly man by the time my dad reached adulthood. I do not know whether he was physically unable to attend my father’s high school football games or was just ignoring my dad like his father ignored him. If my dad did not make a play that was recounted in the following days Alpharetta Neighbor, then my grandfather would not have been able to see his son’s accomplishments. My father’s efforts to get his dad’s attention made him a fierce competitor. I guess that we both wanted our dad’s to notice us.
Dad’s parents were too old to enforce and discipline on my father, so he developed his own methods of dealing with the world and did it in his own time. To make things worse, God made him a handsome man too. If you have ever seen old pictures of Burt Reynolds when he was playing football for Florida, then you have seen my dad too. He would go all the way to Buckhead and pay five bucks for a high class flattop haircut. His clothes he got by donation or discount from the top men’s clothing store of the time, Muse’s (his sister’s husband, Albert sold suits there). All the dominoes slowly fell into place and my dad became preoccupied with the most important thing in his life…himself. Don’t get me wrong, he was and still can be a charming man. He can make you laugh at your mama’s funeral on Christmas Sunday. But his preoccupation with himself has alienated everyone that has ever loved him. He lamented one time on the phone to me that everyone has left him. However, he can’t see that it was him that pushed them away.

It is hard to hate the old bastard, although I have come close several times. I still have hope that he finds love and let’s himself have a little fun before the big dirt nap. He is 62 now, and still chasing young tail. He better be careful. He might just catch one and have to use it.