i'm gonna be like you, dad. you know i'm gonna be like you.' u.s. father's day,...

8/12/2019 I'm Gonna Be Like You, Dad. You Know I'm Gonna Be Like You.' U.S. Father's Day, June, 2014

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I'm gonna be like you, dad. You know I'm gonna be like you.' U.S. Father's Day, June, 2014



Preface / Introduction

This is a great series of articles about Dads and the importance of raising up fine standing civilized

adults in this crazy world.



Table of Contents

1. 'I'm gonna be like you, dad. You know I'm gonna be like you.' U.S. Father's Day, June, 2011.2. 'Am I getting old?' 'Oh, no, not you.' The wonders of the Internet... the stubborn obstinacy of far too many Senior Citizens. Generations colliding in cyber space. Some thoughts.3. My father. The call made to me. The call that will be made for me. Some thoughts.



'I'm gonna be like you, dad. You know I'm gonna be like you.'U.S. Father's Day, June, 2011.

By Dr. Jeffrey Lant

Author's note. To get into the mood of this special Father's Day article, go to any search engine andfind "Cat's in the Cradle" sung by Harry Chapin in 1974. Its refrain is haunting, and every

boy-turned-father understands the bite in the words, often painfully so...

"A child arrived just the other day", February 16, 1947.

It was my birth day but, as I couldn't possibly have known, it was the end of their honeymoon andthat special tea-for-two idyll that comes only once. My parents married February 16,1946; I teasedthem for years about the importance of that last digit.

Like all babies, I expected, demanded and maneuvered to be the center of their lives. It's what babies do.

But I can imagine now what was going on in the weeks prior to that mad-dash to the hospital thattransformed my beautiful young mother from a wife with a constituency of one... into amulti-tasking mother.

I was the first born child, first child, first son, first grandson on both sides; every one of thesedesignations pushed omniscient women forward and my father back. The process, you see, in those post-War years was not made for fathers, no matter how caring. And, upon arrival, I monopolizedmy mother. I've told you, it's what babies do... and even then I was masterful at my craft.

There must have been times, though no one to this day has ever said so, when he missed the bright,laughing eyed girl he'd married. She was the essence of the "fun on a date" 'forties girl who had thegift of joy with lots to spare.

She gave me a clue years later, telling me she didn't like children, didn't mean to have any, andthought they looked like frogs. (Queen Victoria thought so, too). But, she quickly added and alwaysemphasized that all that changed when the nurse handed me over for my first visit, textbook perfectinfantile innocence.

I'd "come into the world in the usual way". And I was determined to keep the full and undividedattention of the woman who didn't yet know how her own instincts would conduce to my constant benefit; literally born yesterday I didn't need Dr. Spock to tell me that.

Into this new, unstudied situation my father had to move and move delicately for now words like"shhhhhh, he's sleeping" meant sacrifice, limitations, and even unwonted loneliness. It was asea-change from the happy "you-for-me-and-me-for-you" days of such recent memory.

"He learned to walk while I was away."

Like most children I don't know what I actually remember or what I have, from pictures and familystories, been taught to remember. But there is hardly a memory either way that is not more her thanhim. He worked hard, long hours, lucky to have a job in the recession that promptly came with our unqualified war victory. She was the center of my universe. And, like Chapin, my first steps were probably taken when he was being a "good provider". But there is a story that sums up the situation.

One hot, humid Illinois summer day (are there any other?) when I was about three, my mother and Iscreamed for ice cream. But there was not a dollar to be had... except for a dollar bill my father hadcirculated amongst his Navy buddies, to be autographed by each. Such a token was not to be

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surrendered lightly, but it was surrendered nonetheless, for the delicacy of an instant and later, poignant regrets. He must have loved us very much to do such a thing... it says volumes about theman.

"My son turned ten just the other day. He said, "Thanks for the ball, dad, come on let's play."

In the suburbs of Chicago in the early Eisenhower years, you needed to be good at handling the ballsof several sports... or so bright that you could afford to ignore sports because you were destined for greater things. My brother filled the first category; I filled the second. I knew my brother was easier to handle; he fit in, particularly the year he made the state Little League team, and we all troopeddown to Freeport to watch him, resplendent in a uniform that said "Moose"; this was lifetimecertification that he was a boy's boy...

I was different, always with my nose in a book, the one who when asked at age 10 or so what hewanted to be when he grew up, without dropping a beat, said "Harvard graduate; millionaire; writer of many books." II wasn't what prairie parents were accustomed to hearing... What's more, it allcame true in due course...

Another celebrated incident took place about this time. My parents and I went to some localswimming hole for a day of the kind of innocent amusements I couldn't wait to escape from. At the

end of the day, it was, I think, my mother who said the inevitable line about their guests, "Cutecouple. Great relationship." That sort of thing. What did I think? Without missing a beat I said Ithought they had problems... and seer-like, foretold splitsvillle. Of course, I was told I was wrong, but just weeks later they separated. My stock soared... and my father pressed me less to fire a gun, build superb back yard igloos, throw a ball, you get the picture. He had to wonder about this creaturesui generis.. and what his role as father might mean or entail.

I was not an easy child, although I say it myself, an interesting one. He must have seen I wasmoving beyond his sphere into uncharted waters. I could hardly wait until it happened and my joy atcrossing another day off the calendar, the sooner to commence my Great Journey, must have been palpable, even affronting. I did not want what his life epitomized and I was too green, unknowing

how to say this without insult... and uncaring about the effect.There was, in those years, more coexistence than empathy., not least because he tried hard to get meto understand and adopt verities he saw as fundamental and essential... about which I had quitedifferent ideas. I severely embarrassed him the day I refused to answer the pastor's call for Communion, being unable to subscribe to the tenets. (I have never taken Communion sincen.)

There was, too, his desire that I should understand the farmer's life practised by all my cousins andshould, as part, learn how to harvest oats and drive a tractor. The first scratched; the second bored. Neither oats nor tractor have played any role in my development.

"Well, he came from college just the other day..."

My launching pad to the vision I had long been shaping for my life came with a college acceptanceletter. ..... and thereafter, too long, communications were as rushed and superficial as Harry Chapinsings.

"I've long since retired and my son's moved away..."

And so it might have stayed, both of us stubborn, obstinate, headstrong -- proud men, unyielding.But, you see, the love that caused a prized war memento to be sacrificed had always been present,waiting for auspicious times. He told me the other day, cast down now and again by the tremors andafflictions of the way we age now, that he was ready to go whenever the good Lord wants him. Andneither he nor I fear that... for we have, at last, found each other and gladly so.







"And as I hung up the phone, it occurred to me, He'd grown up just like me. My boy was just likeme."







'Am I getting old?' 'Oh, no, not you.' The wonders of theInternet... the stubborn obstinacy of far too many Senior Citizens. Generations colliding in cyber space. Somethoughts.

by Dr. Jeffrey Lant.

Author's program note. Did you ever see "Gigi" the 1958 musical by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe? You should. It burned through a fortune to recreate lush, opulent Third Republic Paris and besides the music is lovely. One song in particular touches my heart -- "I Remember It Well".

It's a duet between Honore (Maurice Chevalier) and Mamita (Hermione Gingold), long ago loverswho meet up in the twilight of their lives and reminisce about what happened way back when... andwhat they remember; definitely not the same thing.

Honore gets his every reminiscence slightly wrong; Mamita is spot on with hers. Honore isembarrassed, chagrined at his errors... but the lady doesn't mind. She retains an abiding affection for him... and even in his errors she sees he retains an abiding affection for her. Yes, it's a lovely,

beautiful, bittersweet tune... go now to any search engine. Listen well. Tenacious memories are justone touch away and waiting now for you to release them. Bring an extra handkerchief.

Another missed phone call... another missed opportunity. Another irritating moment for each.

It just happened again. The Missed Call Syndrome. This time he called me.... and missedconnecting. So I called him back... and missed connecting. So now both of us, my 88 year old father and I (aged 65), remain disconnected, and irritated with each other. "Why can't the boy be there at just the moment I want to talk to him?", he mutters. In return I say with pronounced pique, "Whywon't he use a webcam? It would make life so much easier for both of us."

Welcome to the clash of the titans, where one old goat continues to cause unnecessary

communications problems.... and his know-it-all IT son fails (yet again) to show Dad the error of hisways. Thus the Mexican stand-off continues... with both parties irked, irritated, and more than a littleexasperated with each other. What's going on here? Just this. Two obstinate generations, each used togetting its way, are battling to make their communications with the other easier... for we do, I think,truly want to communicate with each other, so long as the other party is dictated to, not dictating.

"Get an email address that works."

Technology to be effective must be simple and easy to use and must not create more problems thanit solves. By this test the email program used by my technically clueless dad is useless, for it causesnothing but problems, not least the fundamental problem that it actually blocks all my email to him.As you may imagine this causes a ton of problems of the "Did you get my email the other day?"

variety.

Why does he keep this completely ineffectual program? Not because it's "easy", because it mostassuredly is not; not because it delivers his mail promptly without hassle because it fails that test too.I'll tell you why he does it... because he feels (though he has never given me the satisfaction of putting his unconvincing case in my unscrupulous hands) that he, having worked a long lifetime for others, is entitled, the end approaching, to have those others (chief amongst them me) work for him...never mind that a completely fast, thorough and easy email system is at hand.

Rigor Mortis before death.







We all know that rigor mortis comes with death; is in fact an undeniable symptom of that death.Sadly, for many, especially in regard to tech skills and proficiency, rigor mortis comes well beforethe end. Common sense dictates that if you want the substantial and undeniable benefits of technology, you must keep up-to-date. But obstinate seniors, like dear old dad, won't keepup-to-date. They have done much for others; they have little time remaining. They don't wantcontinuing education and the "joys of learning". They insist upon being catered to, waited on,kow-tow desired but not required.

Thus if they fail to listen, fail to learn the necessary steps to put technology to work for them and socreate a heap of unnecessary problems, this is unfortunate, but so what? And so they approach theultimate arrogance and deep-seated selfishness of the "Let them eat cake" lady herself, the late,unlamented, backward looking Marie Antoinette, sovereign queen of unthinking, unrepentant,adamant ossification. (If he ever discovers I've written this, Dad will kill me, especially as thecomparison is true and apt! One can, after all, forgive anything but the unanswerable truth.Fortunately he doesn't know how to access my articles at jeffreylantarticles.com He's tried; no cando; and that's that.)

"Get a webcam! Get a webcam at once!"

Writing emails, particularly if you are of the "bread-and-butter", copperplate hand generation like

dad, takes time and careful attention. Words matter; finding just the right word is a courtesy theynever neglect. And they all honor Mark Twain's trenchant line, "If I had more time, I'd write you ashorter letter." As a result their emails are not just written but edited, corrected, refined, no textmessaging allowed; a real letter sent but never responded to in kind by anyone less than 70 or so.

And so another failure-to-communicate incident is born, to smolder and explode without warning.How different things would be if he'd use a webcam -- a webcam I'm wiling to GIVE him!

Consider the following: I have a webcam; my brother has a webcam; my sister has a webcam; her son and daughter each have webcams. Only my father does not have a webcam, considers thevexatious unsettling matter settled and considers all attempts to get him hooked up and active a grave

imposition; unjust; an affront; the very idea lese majeste'.He has for just such moments of offense and insolence and outrage his certain response: "I'm old, I'mtired, I can't do it, I'm falling apart; it's hard; it's difficult; it's...", but you get the picture. How cananyone transgress against such a paladin, now ancient, frail, venerable... and absolutely determinednot to change anything, not by a jot, much less a tittle?

And so the matter unsatisfactorily continues day after day. We are both of us getting older, which is just another way of saying we are getting more and more obstinate by the minute. He frets becausehis time is dwindling with anxious celerity and so each day the little he still wants becomes moreurgent. Why can't I see that?

... But I do see that. That is why I want him to be on a webcam, easily accessible to me and his other wired progeny, not least the only two grandchildren he will never know as well as he ought becausehe is ludicrously behind in what it takes to touch them, share, learn as they hobnob everywhere onEarth and never care to think or understand what he wants, much less help him get it.

His failure to master even the rudiments of the communication techniques and services that existreinforces the very thing he fears most; disconnection from family and friends, alienation, a feelingthat worsens daily that he is not merely aged but irrelevant, obsolete, passed it, already not merelymoribund but actually dead by inches.

He sees a webcam as a threat, exposing all that he does not know. I see it as my only and best chanceto connect with him easily and always before that chance is gone forever and I am forced to lament







what might have been... a state of affairs that chills me now and will haunt me until I, too, am dustand an inadequate memory to those I have loved.

"This too shall pass."

This is one of my father's favorite expressions. He has used it with me over and over again as ameans of lessoning life's plethora of pains and even some moments of exuberance and euphoria, astoo much of a good thing. Now I shall render these words in quite a different way, as an admonition,a warning, an already far too late wake- up call, a clarion to action before even the little I can donow becomes far more than the days ahead will leave me.

And so, I shall again do what I have tried to do so often... I shall say, out of a love which must never be forgotten, what needs to be said and which was never said better than this: "Do not go gentle intothat good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light". Dylan Thomas (1914-1953) insisted onthis to his father. I cannot do less to mine and so I shall tell him this...

Aristides de Sousa Mendes

Do you know this man? You should. Born in 1885 in the Centro region of Portugal, he became adiplomat in the days when Dictator Antonio Salazar ruled. He was stationed in Bordeaux in 1940when the Nazis invaded France. Bordeaux was a prime exit port, a city engulfed in war and chaos; a place to which refugees, many of them Jews, fled, looking for any way to escape. Mendes wasordered by his government to provide no aid, no escape. That was a decree of death. But Mendes wasa man of life.

Thus, between June 17-July 8, 1940 he issued over 30,000 exit visas to refugees and displaced persons, some 12,000 to Jews. One man, just a few days, thousands saved. Needless to say, hisgovernment disowned him, stripping him of diplomatic status, his legal profession, of everything infact except the certain knowledge that he had done the right thing, the righteous thing, the lifeaffirming thing.

And you must do the life affirming thing, too. Thus understand that it is out of our love that we

insist upon your advancing, focused on whatever span is left; still opening windows, however daunting, not closing them. If you will not do this for yourself; then do it for us, as yet another gift of the father. For in such a way, you choose life and hope, something we will surely address andcelebrate when we have our first joyous meeting online by webcam. May it come soon.







My father. The call made to me. The call that will be made for me. Some thoughts.

by Dr. Jeffrey Lant.

It was the call one dreads to hear, the call that one has pondered, tried to dodge, done everything toavoid but which at the end will occur, "Your dearly beloved is on the door step of eternity, soon to

go into the sweet by and by. This is your notice."

And no matter how ready you thought you were, in the event you were not ready at all. For out of this lack of readiness emerges every great question of the human condition ...

Who was I? Why did I come to this place? What did I do here? Did it matter at all? And the greatestquestion of all: where am I going, I who am now poised on the brink of what we call "forever", the place beyond, the place we have so often imagined but which we are now finally to know in all itsimmeasurable, unutterable, awe-inspiring immensity, dread -- and hope?

This time my sister made the call, and it was ominous, "Dad has had a heart attack. It's serious". Atthat moment every task, no matter how important just a moment ago, diminishes at once into

insignificance, thrust aside, forgotten. We have expected it, even in moments of choler and ragewished it, but we are not ready for it...

Now this moment is here. We want to do something. We will do anything. But there is nothing to bedone... except wait and hope, reach out and touch the living, as we stand together in frail solidarityon behalf of our afflicted beloved, the one of us soon to go where all must go... and too soon.

Thus at this moment where we demand the power to alter pending reality, pray for it, parlay for it,we discover instead the necessity of submission. Whatever we believed up to this moment, we nowknow the necessity of resignation. Thus we prepare for the great voyage of our beloved... and help prepare ourselves for our own. Hallelujah!

Acquiescence, jarring meekness, his preparation.

I no longer know, if I even caught it then, when the first manifestation of unwonted gentlenessoccurred. But in due course I came to know and dread each instance. Who is this strange father?Who had taken away the father I knew and left behind this undesired deceit, this facsimile, thisersatz version of the original? This man is gone now....

Yes, the man who as a child was brought low by rheumatic fever, too often fatal, then laboriouslyinched back to life. This man is gone.

And what of the man who went to war, the "good war", to save the rights of people everywhere?Where is this man now? This man is gone.

And what about the man who, with his own hands and determination, built in the wind- swept prairies of the Great Republic a house for his growing family, brick by brick, drop of sweat on dropof sweat under the burning sun that only gave way to the howling snows. No weather, no matter howsevere, blunted his progress. This man is gone.

This man turned each day into a better future. He thought no work beneath him and his work wastenacious, determined, done well. This man had grand objectives and, one step at a time, achievedthem. This man, too, is gone.

So is the darker, sterner man, the man of hot words, of rigid severities, adamant certainties and anobstinacy all his own. I knew this man, respected this man, fought this man, irritated and ignored this







man... but always, in the end, returned to this man, for he was the father and always a force to bereckoned with. This man, so well known, worthy opponent, is gone.

Now a different man has come, a man I do not know.

The chilling declaration, more chilling each time he says it because closer to realization: "I'm readywhenever the good Lord comes for me."

For a lifetime, my father and I have disagreed on many things, but on none as much as religion.

Brought up in the Protestant tradition, he was able to find a comfort, a Saviour, a purpose, a serenitywhich I could not share, although I sought the belief that sustained him and finally allowed him his beliefs without affronting him with the opposition of mine.

In due course, after argument, anger, confrontation and pain, we arrived at an uneasy truce... andeach was careful, so hard won was this truce, to do nothing to threaten it. If we could not agree, atleast we could agree to disagree. This state of affairs suited us both once upon a time... but it suits meno longer.

I want to know, but will never ask and therefore never know, how he can find comfort, peace of mind, serenity in a fable, a legend, a belief fraught with riddles, conflicting things, inconsistenciesand outrageous matters that defy logic. But though I think these things, cannot get beyond thesethings, I shall not say these things... for he is ready, he says, and I believe him, and I do not have theright, or the heart, to disagree.

But I do disagree. My father is soon to leave me. This is bad enough, but as things now stand weseparate for eternity without the perfect understanding and harmony which would ease my futurelife. And this is more than sad; this is a tragedy. We will part forever without fully knowing eachother... and so we talk of indifferent matters, as two grown men might do, while the thing we calleternity inches closer, inexorable, cannot be stopped, certain in its arrival, frightening in everyaspect.

And what is most frightening is that I, his eldest son, am now part of his yesterdays... not of his

tomorrows; of his past experiences, not of his last, his final, his greatest and most important journey.And as the commencement of this journey draws nigh, my importance to him, the importance of every element which constitutes his past, his history, drops and drops again.

Quite simply they no longer matter in any way except to think about, reminisce about and pass thetime while he awaits the only important thing left in a life which once held a pulsating plethora of important things: he awaits the call he has known for a lifetime was coming for him. And his total being is focused thereon.

Thus he awaits The Future... whilst I and every once important thing and person recedes fromsignificance, from consciousness, from care, cause, or concern. For all of us are of The Past. And wedo not matter anymore.

I want this man to fight against the dying of the light, but some inner voice has counseled a verydifferent path... and so the man I knew, the father, drops away to reveal a very different being, hisfocus solely and rightly on what he is sure is coming and that journey which each of us makes aloneand in awe.

And if at this moment, there is pain, suffering and profound grief, these are for the living. For theman I called father has made his resolution, his commitment, and so rests content at the moment Iam sore tried, beset by the questions and uncertainties which are the part of every human... but whichhe has transcended, important no longer.







I want to believe! I try to believe! But in my own honesty I cannot believe and will not demeanmyself, this moment, or especially him by claiming to believe when I do not!

"Jesus, Lover of my Soul"

Thus he slips away a little more, another minute gone forever, another step taken, more of the past,less of the human future... always closer to his new reality, expectant, curious, anxious but sustained by the Peace of God and the Saviour who takes him to it, his guide, his hope, his sure arm, redeemer and eternal support. I watch, I grieve, but I must be glad for him for he is glad and that now iseverything.

And so I give him this, one of the greatest of Protestant hymns, "Jesus, Lover of My Soul" publishedin 1740 by the Reverend Charles Wesley, one of the celebrated family of divines who broughtneeded reform and passion to the stultified 18th century Church of England. They were calledMethodists and my father often adhered to their church and doctrines. This hymn by Wesley, one of over 6000 he wrote was a favorite, and you can find it in any search engine. Go play it now...

"Jesus lover of my soul, let me to Thy bosom fly, While the nearer waters roll, while the tempeststill is high. Hide me, O my Savior, hide, till the storm of life is past; Safe into the haven guide; Oreceive my soul at last."

This is a booming, resonant, Protestant hymn in the grand tradition he so values.

But I want to add a variation, "Jesus, Lover of My :Soul' by the Hillsong Singers.They were inspired by Charles Wesley's opus to write one of their own, his title, his sentiments, but with new words andcontemporary music. It is profoundly moving...

"I love you, I need you/ Though my world may fall, I'll never let you go My Saviour, my closestfriend/ I will worship you until the very end."

Now that end is nigh, a matter of any moment. A thing certain, ever closer, sure. He is ready andwaits with resignation, hope and certainty... whilst I wonder who will make the call for me in mytime. Hallelujah!







Resource

About the Author Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a widerange of online services for small and-home based businesses.

Republished with author's permission by Howard Martell http://HomeProfitCoach.com.


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i'm gonna be like you, dad. you know i'm gonna be like you.' u.s. father's day,...

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