Sure I could go racing from house to house visiting all my friends from high school, but I'd rather just sit around my parents house in my pajamas and watch tv, or enjoy my time with them.
If there is one thing I have learned over the past few years, it's that life is short, and as my parents get older mortality is more and more evident to me.
I certainly don't want to be the child who regrets not spending enough time with them. Although I don't think I will ever spend as much time as I would like especially because I live so far away.
But today was different. It was all about dad time, there was no one around just me and him and the football game.
In so many ways it was like time had stood still and I was back in high school, but yet it was so much different.
After the game he pulled out a box that was sitting next to his recliner and he started going through it.
It was a treasure trove of memories.
Inside were pictures of my aunt and uncle from 50 years ago, his Army dog tags, pictures of his first car, and a car he bought when he came back from being in the military.
There were pictures of my mom, of him in the Army, military letters and certificates, and even a few 'antiques' as he called them.
I even learned the meaning of a 'dance card' straight from the source, although admittedly his was empty because as he says 'I wasn't much of a dancer'.
Not surprising, I don't know if I have ever seen him cut a rug in my life.
There were a few fancy lighters in the box, one is a small Coke bottle. He asked if any of us kids collected Coke stuff and I told him no, and then he just gave it to me. It is at least 50 years old, he assumed it is worth something but I have no idea, and I don't intend on looking into it.
Then as he dug deeper into the box he found an old tripod still in the box. He bought it when he was in the military serving in Germany in 1953, and he said 'do you want this? I don't know if it's ever been used but your the most likely to have and use it I'd say'.
I had to agree, I am the photographer/videographer out of the 3 of us kids. So I snatched it up. It's so cool to have this really old piece of equipment that he held on to for so long that was a part of his life (even though he didn't use it).
He always had a big camera when we went on vacations and photography was something he did quite a bit of when he was younger so this memento is very cool to have.
Although I am a little weirded out that he is doing all of this. It's like he knows something is going to happen and he wants to make sure he tells his history and his 'treasures' are going to be well taken care of.
He initially started looking through the box to find a letter his mother had written to him when he went in the military. His parents were older when he was born and since they didn't know how long he was going to be gone, she just wanted to let him know they had done the best they could and they wished they could have done more for him.
He kept looking for that letter, he had seen it recently but couldn't remember where he had placed it. It's like he wanted me to read it because maybe in some way it summed up how he feels about himself with us kids.
Either way I don't like where any of this is going and how he is acting. It's weird, and even though I know I'm going to have to deal with it eventually I don't want to think about him not being in my life.
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