Archives for January 19, 2010

Sorry I’ve been absent here so long. My dad, who was in fragile health for a couple years, went through a sharp decline in early November. He died on Dec. 2. He was 88, lived a long full life, and died in his bed with my mom holding his hand. We have a lot to be grateful for, I know, but I miss him terribly each day. I had the task of writing his obituary and you can read it here. The ideal version, though, would have a pile of footnotes. Next to the description of him as “indefatigable,” for example, there’d be an asterisk offering this translation: “He wasn’t easy — but on the other hand, we were never bored.”
Here is a little more that’s not in the obituary: My dad was born to parents who were advanced in years and didn’t much want a child, let alone an “indefatigable” one. Then the Depression came and his father lost everything, including the will to go on. My dad spent most of his teens hanging out at the Marlborough firehouse because he didn’t feel welcome at home. I remember him telling me once that he was always hungry. In an attic somewhere there’s a copy of a letter he wrote at 16 to an area businessman asking for advice on how he could get on in the world. Then he joined the Navy and shipped off to the South Pacific. I write this to point out that my father understood hard times and loneliness, and the gifts he had — his scrappiness, his sense of humor, his generosity to others, his tolerance — seem bound up to me with the boy he was.
I remember once coming home from school, feeling bleak in that hopeless way that happens when you’re a kid and can’t even begin to express what’s going on to adults. I forget what the specific trouble was, but it must have been a time when I was “out” at school. That happened once in a while. My mom spoiled me but she didn’t understand; she was (and remains) the sort of person who’s largely impervious to the idea of fitting in (one of the first sayings she taught me was: “F**k ’em if they can’t take a joke”), which is a great quality but one I didn’t inherit. I remember my dad — who could be loud and impatient, who usually wanted me to come hold a lawn bag open for him while he raked up leaves or help him pick up dog crap in the backyard — sort of peering at me when I came in, and then later that afternoon he made me milk-on-toast in a bowl, something I had never had before, and we sat on the high stools in the kitchen looking out the window together, and I felt immeasurably comforted. I don’t remember talking to him about what was going on. I didn’t have to. He could be good company like that. He must have been 60 then; he’d recently retired against his own inclination (he had become “out” at work), and it was still strange to have him at home.
My stepson wrote my mom a beautiful letter after my dad’s death, and he’s given me permission to quote from it, “Dana to me was a presence of wry joyfulness. He had a rare talent for making fun of things without reducing their value. I always got the feeling that his humor was coming from a sincere and intimate place. He was an easy guy to be around — though I should take care not to oversimplify him because I know he could certainly stir things up when he felt like it. I never had to wonder with Dana whether I was getting the whole picture or not, and that always made me feel comfortable.” My stepdaughter’s card also made me cry. It said simply, “We’ll miss him too.”
We’re holding the memorial celebration this coming Sunday, on what would have been his 89th birthday. I’m looking forward to being with my mom, my three half-siblings, a handful of nieces and nephews, as well as an amazing number of the friends my dad made as he went through the world. Please think of us and raise a toast if you can.

My guess is that I’ve probably passed on enough Pops-related links, but here are two more that might interest you:
• The Huffington Post has posted a link to the podcast version of my hour-long interview with Christopher Lydon. This was the most satisfying audio-only interview that I’ve done about Pops to date, partly because it was so well produced but mostly because Lydon was so well prepared. In truth it’s a conversation, not an interview, and my only regret is that Lydon and I weren’t in the same studio (he was in Boston, I at NPR’s headquarters in Washington, D.C.). Go here to listen.
Warning, Mom: I say two words out loud in this interview that you won’t want to hear. Cover your ears and forgive me–I was only quoting Satchmo!
• The Los Angeles Public Library has posted a podcast of the version of my stump speech that I gave there last month. Go here to download it.

“Thought is only a gleam in the midst of a long night. But it is this gleam which is everything.”
Henri Poincaré, The Value of Science (trans. George B. Halsted)