Bear Hunting with a Switch
“God Damn,
you’re big enough to go bear hunting with a switch”, was the observation I
often heard from my dad, on the rare occasions that he took notice. He made this comment because I was a
big graceless girl, with a lumbering slew footed gait, the proverbial bull in
the china shop. I had a large moon shaped face with oversized front teeth and freckles
splotching my chubby cheeks. At 5’9” I was almost as tall as my dad and had a
loud carrying voice. Oddly, what I
heard, when dad told me this, was that I was strong and able to take care of myself. It wasn’t until later I realized what
he had actually been telling me was that he thought I was fat and graceless and
a little repulsive to him.
One of his
four children, I was the third girl and about five years older than my brother,
the last of us to be born. Our dad never hesitated to share his opinion of our
intelligence, abilities or body type.
Encounters with him often left us shaken both figuratively and in
actuality, so our goal was to stay out of his sight, knowing the less notice he
took of us the safer we would be.
The only time this would change was after he had a few drinks.
Growing up I
didn’t know the term, alcoholic but I did see how dad’s personality changed
when he drank. When sober, his
temper was short and his disposition dour but like a reverse of Dr. Jeckel and
Mr. Hyde he became outgoing and sociable when he drank. He also became impulsive
and uninhibited so that our world often careened from one extreme to the other.
In either persona he painted our
world in big gestures and broad strokes, as likely to backhand one of us for
accidentally interrupting, as he was to buy a horse and lead it home on a rope
strung out of the back window of the station wagon.
I don’t have
clear memories of my dad, just a vague outline of a barrel-chested muscular man
with dark hair. From old pictures
I can see that he might have been considered handsome. In his day he would have been described
as “black Irish,” dark and brooding, with a dark complexion, curly black hair,
light hazel eyes and a burly frame.
He was an intelligent
man, a tool and die maker, as they were called then. Always curious in a compulsive way, he would immerse himself
in a particular subject. When
sated he was just as quick to release it, never to think of it again. He once purchased a microscope for the
sole purpose of viewing mold growing on cheese. He had a brief career as a
professional wrestler, under the name of Bobby Lund. By turns a photographer or
a cook in the merchant marines, he moved his family regularly to pursue each
endeavor.
When I was
in the third grade he took a job in Chicago and instead of moving, mom stayed
in Indianapolis with us. In
Chicago he met another woman and eventually he and mom divorced after
twenty-three years of marriage. None
of us regretted his absence. He had no comprehension of the injuries he had
inflicted on his family. He left us damaged, his children feeling ashamed and
inadequate, his wife worn out from trying to appease him.
He was fifty-three years of age when he died
of cirrhosis, a sick and lonely man. At sixty-two I understand how short his
life had been. How hot does a
person’s soul burn to flame out in such a short amount of time? What demons chased this man, my father?
Maybe he was his own demon, as well as ours.
I was twenty
when he died, years before I began wondering about why I am, who I am and I did
find many answers to that question. I know parts of the hulking young girl came
forward into my adult life. Undeniably, the insecure and awkward girl is here—but
the girl that heard strong and able, instead of fat and graceless, has also
been there to guide me.
Perhaps, I
truly have gone bear hunting with a switch.
Diana, for
the Poplar Grove Muse
