Happy Birthday, Pop!

This is my dad. This picture was probably taken...well, seeing as my dad always looked pretty much the same, it's kind of hard to say. He was probably in his early 30s? He always looked older, and studious.

Today is my dad's birthday. He would have been 75 this year. He died 10 years ago last week (why do men in my family die on or near their birthdays?). It completely stinks not to have him around, and believe me when I tell you that 10 years passing doesn't make me miss him less.

I told my mom that what really got me is that he was there one day and gone the next, just like someone reached down and plucked him off the earth. And what is one of the hardest things is that I wasn't done with him yet. Not that I ever would have been, but I found myself always and forever in awe of my dad's intellect, and learning from him constantly. And I have yet to find anyone who I put such faith in. If I asked my dad something, his answer was THE answer. Now, I do have a mind of my own, of course, and he and I disagreed and butted heads on plenty of things. And there were plenty of questions I didn't ask him! But when I asked him something, I didn't have to question it. Like when I was buying my house. That was all me and my dad. He went with me to look at it, and saw me through everything right down to getting the keys (not physically; I am pretty independent; but questions or concerns on things financial or other aspects of home owning? He was the guy).

Once he made me practice math over the summer because I'd had a rough go of it and he knew I could do better (he was right about that, too; I did great in math in high school, but hated it in grade school). So I got a workbook from school at the beginning of the summer and would do the work and give it to him to correct. I remember getting very confused about fractions (I don't remember the specifics, but it was something relatively complicated, like how you multiply them or something) so I asked him, and he explained it to me right then and I kept going.

Now, if you were to come up to me asking me to help you multiply fractions, well, you'd be out of luck pal. And strangely, I am the age that he was then. And I don't have all the stuff that he had in his head. I'm single with no kids, and I'm not responsible for the daily operations of a large university, as he was. And yet he remembered how to multiply fractions, just like that. How the eff did he remember THAT?

He could help me with my French homework because he could read French. His grammar and spelling were impeccable, he wrote articles and books, he had so much knowledge between his ears.

He was a stubborn man, and he could really get a temper, and he was far too conservative in many aspects, IMHO. But criminy was he smart. When my mom first started going out with him she didn't realize he was an entire year younger than she, because they were in the same class in high school. The reason behind that is because my dad skipped a grade. And he only stayed in my mom's high school for a year because he got bored and didn't feel the education there was doing him any good.

My grandma used to get calls from school regularly at home or at work because my dad would leave school and go play pool. He was just that smart. Crap that I had to work at and pull my hair out over, he could do in his sleep. And I'm on the smart side, amigos.

But I digress.

I'd like to think I've done pretty well since he passed. I'm a pretty darned happy person all things considered, and I do well and I like to think I help make the world a better place in some way. But there is nothing, nothing in the world, nothing and no one, who could ever take the place of my dad. I won't see the likes of him until we meet up again, some day.

Happy Birthday, Dad. Boozer loves you and misses you. Every damn day.