Dads Fill a Special Place in a Daughter’s Heart

If I had to choose my favorite memory of Father’s Day, it would be the backyard picnics where our collection of 13 family members gathered for an afternoon feast of fried chicken, potato salad, corn-on-the-cob and homemade rolls, served up with a healthy side of laughter. Weather permitting, we usually made it through the full meal beneath blue skies, but occasionally an afternoon storm blew in unannounced, generating havoc as paper plates flew like Frisbees.

At the center of the table stood a mile-high angel food cake loaded with Grandma’s glossy seven-minute frosting tinted in green or yellow (it was Father’s Day so pink was out of the question). But – and here comes the good part – the star attraction was the homemade ice cream spooned directly out of the freezer. Churned by hand, this epitome of ice cream came courtesy of the day’s guests of honor: my two uncles, Grandpa, and Daddy.

The freezer, packed with ice chunks and rock salt, was placed on the grass where the men took turns hunkering down to slowly roll the handle while one of the other men knelt across from the crank-turner to hold the whole contraption steady. It was hard work making ice cream in those days.

At the heart of the ice cream freezer, inside the steel canister, wooden paddles plowed through the liquid concoction mixed up earlier that day. We used the same recipe every year – along with cream, sugar and vanilla, it included raw eggs. Year after year we consumed that ice cream without adverse effects from the uncooked eggs, which makes me wonder if we had better eggs back then or if we are just a little more worried about stuff today. But I know one thing: we never varied from the recipe. Nobody added so much as a strawberry or sliver of chocolate to what was perfection itself.

If the weather turned ominous, it generally ensued during ice cream cranking time since storms in Colorado can kick up suddenly in late afternoon. Chilling out at the long wooden table in our backyard with tummies filled to bursting, we kids were already eyeing Grandma’s cake excitedly when – boom! A mighty clap of thunder and gusting force of wind ripping through the backyard sent us flying. We scrambled inside, our noses filled with the sweet scent of oncoming rain. The moms hastily gathered up tablecloths and dinnerware, leftover chicken and Grandma’s cake and scooted indoors, the old screened back door banging shut behind them. Meanwhile the men grabbed the ice cream freezer and beat it inside where they nestled the freezer firmly in the kitchen sink and resumed their task, the first drops of rain still clinging to their hair. 

After dessert came gift opening. Terribly unoriginal, each year four identical gift-wrapped boxes were handed out, the homemade cards revealing the recipient’s identity. It was the dads’ little joke to act surprised by their gifts since every year they each received a long-sleeved white dress shirt; shirts to replace last year’s gift, which had become a bit tattered during its year of wear. Within the framework of male church-going garb, those white shirts were the standard issue.  

The high point for me was giving my dad the gift I had made for him at school. Some of my earlier offerings were fairly creative: a small plaster print of my 6-year-old hand and a black framed silhouette that was my gift to him when I was 7. Although the value of the gifts was minimal, he graciously kept them all. Winking, he deemed them “priceless.”

When we’re young, we believe our dads will never leave us, and the time spent with family will be ours for the asking for as long as we wish it to be. We get a little complacent as teenagers, perhaps asking to escape the family dinner to see a movie with a friend or hang out with our pals who were just way cooler than family. Today I’m grateful for a mom who gave me the old evil eye if I even thought about skipping out on Father’s Day because the day came too soon when I realized how truly precious those long-ago times were.  

And I’m thankful for a gentle, soft-spoken dad whose words were few but meaningful because they held the key to the person I became. Making my father proud was of paramount importance to me when he was alive, but he chose to hold his opinions to himself, seemingly holding my brother’s accomplishments in higher regard than mine. Later I learned that a parent understands when one child’s life comes easier than another’s and when that happens, the parent compensates for life’s inequities.

So my dad, the champion of irony, died unexpectedly the week of Father’s Day 2003. And if I ever doubted my father’s affection for me, it ended the day we laid him to rest. A small group of older women – all of them great friends of my dad’s – were gathered around me. I could tell they were in a story-telling mood. My widowed father was handsome and fun and popular with the ladies so I looked forward to hearing their stories about my dad. Because he died so close to Father’s Day, it was an especially difficult time, and I was looking forward to a little levity from these feisty “girls,” and they gave it to me – big time.

As the women finally stood to leave, one of them encircled my shoulder with her frail arm and gently inquired how I was doing. I said I was fine, but missing my dad. “Oh, honey,” she replied with a twinkle in her eye, “your daddy loved you so much. Of course he loved your brother, too, but he thought you hung the sun and the stars.”

With one final act of his familiar contrariness, my dad turned the tables and granted me that priceless gift on Father’s Day.

Gale Hammond is a 23-year Morgan Hill resident. Reach her at Ga*********@*ol.com.