Saturday, August 6

Dad passed 38 years ago today in 1973.  I was 13.  The Senate Watergate hearings had been going on all summer, starting May 17 and concluding August 7.  I had been glued to our T.V. set in Dearborn Heights, Michigan watching, until it was time to spend a couple weeks with my sister, brother-in-law and brand new nephew in Niles.  It was there we were called and told Dad had been taken to the hospital by ambulance the night before after going out for ice cream with Mom at the Stroh’s ice cream parlor near the local Farmer Jack’s grocers.  We left immediately and drove the four hours or so.  When we arrived at the hospital we were informed, Mom, sister and I that Dad had passed during the night from a burst pancreas.

I think he would have enjoyed watching with me my daughter’s horse riding lesson today.  He could have sat next to me on the bleacher and told me it reminded him of his days back on the farm in Italy where he met Mom and my sisters were born.  At 51 now, the age he was then, I am coming to terms with the DNA he gave me and enjoying the memories of our short time together like a finely aging wine, the kind I watched him make in our basement.