About Daddy (1)

Daddy had his own emotional problems. Everyone in the family was affected, of course. It’s hard to lose a parent at twelve or thirteen years of age. That’s when Daddy lost his dad. He’d already lost his older brother before that. So, double whammy, so to speak!
I guess he loved that dad dearly. All his life he kept a framed photo of him on the chest of drawers in his bedroom. It was a sort of sacred ‘shrine’ that nobody touched. He didn’t have so many good things to say about his dad, however. He’d say his dad was a butcher who never ate vegetables—only meat (large cuts) and potatoes and other starches. That habit probably helped to lead him to an early death from arteriosclerosis as well as the other sclerosis (atherosclerosis) at age thirty-three I think it was.
He said his dad would give spending money to his siblings, all three smaller than he, but never to him. He’d tell Daddy to go earn his spending money if he wanted some. I don’t know if he did that to try and encourage independence in my dad or because of some ill-will toward him. My Daddy was somewhat arrogant and boastful, so, maybe his dad did that to combat those traits. I really don’t know how his dad was in that respect. I know his dad liked gambling and would (at least?) take my Dad, who was seven or eight years of age I suppose, to the places in which they would play cards, etc. for hours on end. From this information I wrote my poem, ‘The Manly Gamblers’ posted at abctales.com.
Then his dad died after being bedridden for maybe a year. This illness was a disaster on their meager funds so Daddy had to go to work at age thirteen more or less. He had actually had a rich childhood of intense ‘adventures’ up to that time. I say rich in terms of experiences. Fortunately he was intelligent (although, I think, dyslexic) and was able to keep his jobs and earn what the incomplete family needed.
After all, he had those younger sisters and brother to help.