Remembering My Dad on His Birthday

Had he lived, my dad would have turned 95 today. When he was born, Calvin Coolidge was president and there were no radios, televisions, or computers. Phones were a luxury, electricity still a novelty, commercial air flight someone's dream. He was the older brother to his sibling, Robert Lee Ash. Together they went to Europe to fight in World War II, and only one of them returned. I never knew my uncle, Bobby.

He met my mom while at basic training in Hays, Kansas--she was from northern Oklahoma. They married when he returned home after his brother's death. She was a beautician. He sold insurance for a time in the panhandle of Maryland and then moved to Michigan where two of his mother's brothers had relocated. Briefly he worked with one of his uncles in a steel mill, but then found work in a new automobile engine manufacturing factor. There he worked for 30 years; first building the engines and then eventually supervising others with a secretary and all. He died less than three months after retiring at the age of 65. Massive heart attack, declining health prior to that--emphysema--the result of a lifetime of smoking.

My dad found his place in the heart of the 20th century. He was a funny guy, loved the joke. Kept way too many of his demons inside of himself--outside of laughter, not into the emotional stuff. Taught me to love and know the woods. He had a way with animals that I have seemed to inherit, too. I know he wasn't perfect, but given all the rest of what I know about life--I wouldn't trade him out for anybody else.