Waxing Nostalgic

I’m getting older and more nostalgic as I go. It’s probably not healthy to spend so much time thinking about or dwelling on the past, but all it takes is hearing a few notes from a song, hearing someone quote a line from a movie, or driving by a spot where a restaurant used to be and you’ve lost me for the next several minutes, if not longer. My mind constantly takes me to a place where I end up reliving a moment from my past. I think that’s the reason the dial on SiriusXM tends to hang out on the 70’s and 80’s channels. It’s probably not the safest idea to have my mind on Raspberry Berets, wondering whatever happened to Jack and Diane, climbing up on Solsbury Hill, or reminiscing about the Summer of ’69 (even though I wasn’t born yet) while I’m driving, but hey, I’ve got to be me.

I can only hear “Sunday Bloody Sunday” on the record player between the twin beds in the room Scott and I shared growing up. And any tune by the Thompson Twins reminds me of spending the summers at White Water because that seemed to be the only tape (yes, I meant tape) the water park owned. And if I hear “Careless Whisper” by Wham, my mental time machine transports me staight back to the sixth-grade dance and the first time I danced with a girl. Here’s looking at you, Angie Fredd.

Sometimes I can name that memory in just three notes.

And if I’m flipping channels and run across a John Hughes movie, I’m putting down the remote control and spending the next two hours in Saturday detention or cruising around Chicago with Ferris.

Heck, sometimes I watch the Dallas Cowboys play only because it reminds me of the days when they could actually win a playoff game.

I get overly nostalgic every July 9th and November 26th. Those are important dates on my calendar, but ones I don’t have to circle. Those are my Dad’s birthday and the day he passed away. On those days, my mind is occupied with memories and laughs, and then more memories and laughs. I usually write something about him on those days, but I tend to keep my thoughts about him to myself the rest of the year unless I’m talking to my family or a friend who has also lost a parent. It’s tough to describe that bond in words. If you know, you know.

I thought I would throw out a few words about him because a memory struck me when I walked through Ella’s room last night, and I saw the toy guitar we bought her last year. It reminded me of the toy guitar that mom and dad bought Scott when I was about five-years-old. Normally, there would be nothing significant about a toy guitar. It’s not as if your child is actually going to learn to play on it because the strings are impossible to tune. No matter how hard I try to tune it, each string sounds like I stepped on a different cat’s tail. But Scott’s guitar was significant because it was on this guitar that Dad would play his early morning wake-up songs for the kids.

The songs weren’t musical per se, but they were effective in getting us out of bed. You see, tuning wouldn’t have mattered because Dad never learned any actual chords on the guitar, which was fine because when he sang, he never bothered to hit any actual notes. We knew that waking up and getting ready for school was the only way to make the songs stop. It’s a unique talent that can make a six-year-old kid want to get out of bed.

That was part of the greatness of my dad. He took an event as ordinary as waking up and turned it into a hilarious memory that still stays with me. So many times I think I want to “make a difference,” and I feel like it has to be some grandiose gesture they will write about in the history books. The truth is I have opportunities every day that seem insignificant to me but could mean everything to someone else. A laugh, a little act of kindness, a smile, a hug, or just telling someone you love them, those things can fuse to your your heart forever.

I don’t think my dad knew that his songs would have this lasting impact on me, but I know why Dad sang those songs. It’s the same reason he spent his free time watching reruns of “The Three Stooges” and “The Benny Hill Show.” My dad never wanted to grow up. And I’m glad he never did.

You never know what impact your actions will have on someone else. I heard a saying once, “To the whole world you may be just one person, but to one person, you just may be the whole world.” I don’t know of a better phrase to describe the relationship between a kid and their parent. Some days, he was my whole world.

I hope someday my girls can say the same thing about me.