Our dads are often our first Valentines, and that certainly was true of me. My dad would have been 90 years old today. If ever a person was born on an appropriate day, Dad would have been that person. When I was small, I remember that every Valentine's Day would be celebrated with a heart-shaped cake, baked from scratch by my mom, and usually an orchid corsage festooned with ribbons for her from my dad. Mom and Dad were the original hopeless romantics. Only 19 and 20 when they wed in 1942, they were always smooching, hugging and leaving each other little love notes - "ILY" was a common signoff. I never heard them call each other by any name except "Honey" or "Darling" - I remember wondering if they even knew each other's given names! They were childhood sweethearts, having met when they were in grade school. When World War II started, Dad enlisted in the Army Air Corps. One afternoon, when Mom was washing dishes, Dad sneaked up behind her, put his hands into the soapy water, and proposed to her by slipping a diamond ring on her left hand. They married in a small ceremony shortly after that. Dad had a check for $50 in back pay, and with that, they bought their marriage license, an ivory satin wedding dress for Mom, fabric to make a veil, white satin strappy high-heeled shoes, size 5 1/2, and a bouquet of white roses tied up with sheer white ribbon. Their wedding picture shows a couple who looked very young, and indeed they were. Their marriage lasted for 63 years, so they must have done something right for a very long time.
When we were growing up, we were raised in the church of my father's homeland, and which did not allow dancing. Since they were not allowed to dance, Mom and Dad would instead go roller skating, performing as a well-synchronized pair,each in their own pair of wooden-wheeled skates. It sure looked like dancing to me, but since it was being done on a varnished wooden floor, they managed to waltz and box-step to their hearts' content, and were never reproached. At home, after we were supposed to be in bed, I remember peering down through the floor vent of my upstairs room, to watch Mom and Dad dance to the tunes of Bing Crosby, Les Brown, Rosemary Clooney and later, Mantovani and Andy Williams. They were a perfectly matched pair, graceful and lyrical. Fortunately, the church DID allow women to wear makeup, and Mom, to this day, cannot start her day until she has put on her lipstick. Back in the day, that lipstick was often a bright red, which Dad would often kiss off, leaving him wearing almost as much lipstick as Mom! We kids were often branded with the same bright lipprints, usually on our foreheads or cheeks.
Dad always loved to get the sweetest, mushiest valentine cards to give to Mom, and she reciprocated in kind. For a long time, Mom kept special things in the Lane Cedar Chest she received when she graduated from Everett High School in 1939. As a kid, I loved to dig through the keepsakes in that old Lane cedar chest, reading and re-reading the valentines, redolent with the spicy smell of cedar, that she had received from Dad over the course of their lifetime together . The older cards were memorable for their puffy satin hearts on the cover, or some honeycomb pop-up feature, along with filigreed-paper cutouts. They were SO pretty, and you can imagine how romantic it seemed to me back then. Dad hated artificial flowers, but he never complained about the silk roses that often topped the red and pink heart-shaped boxes of Whitman's chocolates that Mom would always present to Dad on this special day.
Working in a greenhouse was an ideal setting for my dad. He had unlimited access to the flowers that he loved so much, and our home was always redolent with the distinctive fragrance of carnations and the spicy aroma of the geraniums on our front porch. Dad was quite a flirt, as is often true of dimpled, twinkle-eyed boys, and there was nothing he liked better than to give flowers to the ladies. It was very common, no matter where we lived, to find bouquets on the counters of coffee shops, service stations, and other places regularly patronized by my dad. After we moved to Wenatchee, Dad became involved in barbershopping, singing with his quartet, "The Extra Fancies." Every Valentine's Day, Dad and the other fancy-guys in his quartet would strap on their red satin cummerbunds, and spend the day delivering singing valentines all over town. The performance was never complete without the presentation of a long-stemmed red rose to someone else's honey. To Dad, aka "Cupid", there was no better way to spend his birthday.
We almost never saw Mom and Dad exchange cross words when we were growing up, causing me to believe that married couples didn't ever argue. Of course, as I became a grownup myself, I learned that that is not true, and in fact, a healthy discussion of differences of opinion is good for a relationship at times, when done in a way that preserves everyone's dignity. When I talked to Mom about this years later, she said that, although she and Dad did have differences of opinions, they didn't feel it was right to argue in front of us. I am very grateful for that - as children, we were never forced to take sides against one of our beloved parents in a quarrel - that was a great gift for us.
If dahlia-season was in February, Dad would have cut huge bouquets of his favorite extra-large blooms and adorned our home with them every Valentine's Day. As it was, the greenhouse carnations and the lovely orchids became the memories that we keep in our hearts. Happy Valentine's Day, Mom, and Happy Birthday, Dad!
No comments:
Post a Comment