My Dad passed away on January 11, 2001. He was 87 years old.
He was an intelligent and super inquisitive individual who thought about things that his peers mostly didn’t/couldn’t and, if they did, he thought about them in a whole different way. He was a gifted athlete and a guy who could figure out how to do whatever needed to be done, fix whatever needed fixing and provide for his family with limited resources. Like his Father and brothers, he was a blacksmith and in a town of ~700 people he learned how to get by. At an early age he learned that “providing” meant bringing home all manner of fish and game and he became a "crack shot".
What follows is a eulogy that I wrote for his memorial service.
“Let’s take my Impala, Pappy. It’s so much more comfortable than your Kraut Can”.
Bill’s suggestion really pissed me off and, while it was true that his shiny yellow Impala SS was much more comfortable than my Dad’s VW, his attitude reeked of his assumed superiority and I resented it. His every word dripped with condescension. Where did he get off calling my Dad “Pappy”? I never understood what my Dad saw in this haughty, holier-than-thou co-worker from Boeing. Bill was a total dick.
They had gone deer hunting a couple of times and Bill always had new shiny gear that he liked to talk about and show off and compare to whatever my Dad had. It didn’t matter whether it was a car, a gun, a tent, a sleeping bag, a cot, whatever. Bill‘s was better and he never missed a chance to point that out. On this day we were going to the shooting range in south Seattle.
At the pistol range Bill broke out this beautiful hardwood box that was velvet lined and held what looked like a very expensive handgun with a European sounding name. My Dad and I used an old revolver and took turns. I was lousy and erratic but my Dad was good. He would take patient, deliberate shots, as though he was savoring each one. He was probably considering the cost of each trigger pull and wanted to make them count as they had when he was young, bullets were expensive and if you missed you didn’t have meat for dinner. He consistently placed his rounds into a tightly clustered pattern. Bill blazed away next to us with his Euro-Disco-weapon as though more was better. Clip after clip. He was so happy with himself until he compared his targets to my Dad’s and found that his pattern was much larger than the paper target itself.
“Here, Pappy”, Bill said, “Try mine. I don’t have the sights quite right yet but after using it you may have to figure out how to afford one of your very own. Of course, there were only 50 made. They are very expensive, you know”.
“God, what a pompous ass”, I thought.
My Dad allowed Bill to load it with his special ammo and after a reminder from Bill that the sights were off he took aim and squeezed off a shot. It was between the outer ring and the edge of the paper. He aimed and squeezed off another one. Closer this time. The next seven shots were clustered within a three inch pattern centered on the bullseye.
“Why, Walter! What a lucky shot you are”, Bill exclaimed with a
chagrined expression.
My Dad just handed the piece back to him and said “Nice gun, Bill”.
We proceeded to the trap shooting area where Bill removed his semi-automatic shotgun from its fur-lined case. The wood of the butt and stock glistened in the sun and the metal was spotless. By comparison, my .410 break action-single looked bruised and beaten, a sad joke-of-a weeny shotgun. My Dad’s 12 gauge pump was clean but showed the signs imparted by decades of use. Like my .410 he had sold it when money was tight and bought them back when he could afford to. Both guns had taken a beating while out of his possession but he cleaned them up as best he could and insured that they functioned flawlessly.
We took turns shooting and launching clay pigeons. I never could hit shit with that .410 and Bill reminded me that someday I might own a real gun. “What a prick”, though he did a reasonable job of shooting and missed very few. My Dad didn’t miss any.
I had resigned myself to launching birds since Bill said that I was “wasting” them by shooting and not hitting any, plus he had taken to giving me “advice” and I had had enough of it. I guess that Bill was feeling pressured by my Dad’s performance and needed to one-up him so he proposed that I launch two at a time. He got them both about half the time with his semi-automatic and was feeling pretty cocky. My Dad’s gun was a pump so Bill offered his. I’m sure that he felt that with an unfamiliar gun my Dad’s aim would be off. When he called “Pull” and I launched two, Boom! Boom! Both exploded and fell in pieces.
Bill
was shocked. “Nice shooting, Pappy.” Let’s
see if you can do it again”.
My Dad did it again and again and again. Then he handed the gun back to Bill whose face looked that a man who was trying to smile in spite of severe constipation.
He simply said, “Nice gun, Bill”. I couldn’t suppress a smile.
My Dad had always been able to shoot like that. He was totally comfortable with his firearms and could outshoot anybody with their own gun.
Earlier when the family would gather in Mullinville or Greensburg the “men” would get their guns and go for a ride in the country. We would drive down those roads looking for any living thing to shoot at. The open windows bristled with gun barrels and pity the poor rabbit that we happened upon. Gunfire would erupt and another would bite the dust or dash off to survive another day as a fusillade of bullets spit up dust in their retreat. I was usually the youngest and that special distinction carried a price. It meant that I seldom got to shoot from the car but had to go pick up the unfortunate animal and deliver the coup de gras if one was required. That was one distasteful job and I didn’t like it at all. If it was my Dad who had been doing the shooting the rabbit was always done for with his first shot. I never had to finish the job for him and I am eternally grateful for that.
On one such Search and Destroy Mission Uncle Bus offered my Dad a chance to try his gun. There was a big Jack sitting way off the road. It wouldn’t have been a sure shot with a rifle. It was a ridiculously long shot for a handgun, especially one you were unfamiliar with. My Dad aimed and fired and the rabbit was dead. Bus looked out into the field where the Jack had stood and with a nonplussed expression said, “Shee-it, Walt”. My Dad simply handed the gun back and said “Nice gun, Bus”.
I gleefully ran out into field to retrieve the trophy.
My
Dad delivered advice and guidance with the same marksmanship. He didn’t waste words and he didn’t miss the
target. Unfortunately for me I was a
stubborn guy and wore the armor of self-righteousness, so much of his wisdom
bounced off only to be picked up after I had “tried it my own way” without
success.
When
I did, I could just imagine him saying, “Nice
gun, Jon”.