A Tale of My Father

A Tale of My Father

My father and I were not particularly close. In my early years I saw very little of him since he spent so much time at work. As I grew older, I realised that this was because he was earning the money to support us all. At the time, he was little more than a symbol of authority, used so often as the threat behind the order: wait till your father gets home.

Even when I understood how duty to his family had ruled him, I remained distant from him. We were both English, after all, and expressions of affection or familiarity were foreign to us. I was happy enough with this arrangement anyway; I might not have the kind of father who took me to sports games or taught me to fish but I was left alone to develop my own interests.

So I found it difficult to think of an occasion that showed a wonderful feature of my father’s personality. And then I heard a phrase that gave me inspiration. Someone suggested that my father might have taught me something special. I knew immediately that this was my answer.

Yes, I remembered vividly a time when I had learnt something from the old man. It happened when I was about sixteen years old and I regard it as one of those pivotal moments that affect one forever afterwards. He was driving me somewhere in the car (I forget where but we lived a long way out of town at the time so it was going to be a fairly long journey) when he reached into his pocket and produced a small card - of the business card type, quite small but about to prove of momentous importance. He handed it to me and continued driving while I read it.

This is what it said: No, no, please continue with your story. I'm a bit of a bull*hitter myself at times. ('Cept there was no asterisk in his version)

I laughed and he smiled but said nothing. The importance of the event was that, in those days, adults never swore in front of the children. As teenagers we knew all the words, of course, but were also expert at the game of feigning complete ignorance of them. This was the first time my father had knowingly used such coarse language within my hearing, even if it was only in writing.

It was, indeed, my coming of age celebration.


Word Count: 447