My dad, developed into an adult during the 1940s-1950s. The war (world war 2) must have affected his interests and outlook for the rest of his life. Although he was not a combat veteran, he was in the Navy for a short period of time and that experience provided him with the beginnings of an education in navigation and electronics that would set a path to a career as an electrical engineer. An expanding and relatively optimistic economy in the 1950s through the 1960s provided him opportunity to have a prosperous career then a family, that’s where I arrive. My mother was part of that too, of course.
The 1970s and 1980s were my growing up years, no cell phones, or computers or internet, and video games were just coming out. We rode our bikes everywhere and explored outdoors for fun.
Me being your basic daydreamer type of child liked my family, despite my sibling rivalry with my brother. Mom and dad provided a very stable home for us. I never saw my parents disagree or raise their voices at each other my entire life! Both mom and dad were responsible with most everything that I could see, so the stability of that is something I saw every day of my life. Some may call it boring, or an easy life. We went to school and did work around our house, and on other family projects.
My dad had this easy going attitude about most everything, he never seemed too particularly excited about things, however he was never sour or complaining either. When it came to doing things around the house such as repairs or something difficult that he had not done before, he found a way to challenge himself and enjoy the process of discovering how to do something and the learning process involved in completing whatever it was. Unknown to me at the time though, he was just finding ways to enjoy being with his son. I certainly picked this up from him because that is exactly the way I approach most everything I do even long after I left home. He always was interested in asking me about what I was doing, or how things were going at work with my career.
All of this led to a feeling of absolute security in me, and in my family. My dad’s sister’s families appeared to be very similar as well, at least to my young eyes. So it extended beyond our own home. This is sense of security that I felt and still feel today.
However, I have learned through meeting other people and hearing about their life experiences that my experience with my parents was actually quite unusual. I had really only seen their example and the example of their families and friends with their children. I just assumed that all parents were like that to their children. This went quite far into my adulthood. As I met people and heard their stories and experiences I realized that it was a true gift to me and my brother a life of being a child when we were children, and as we grew up our parents always treated us as who we were at the time and adjusted their treatment of us based on our age and maturity. We were never expected to be anything different than what we were. I know that they enjoyed watching grow up and taking care of us. I also remember that web I moved on to college, being away from home that my mom struggled with it for a while. I also did see how she kept this to herself, and that she missed when I was away, but she had to let me go because that is exactly what she had worked to create in me, an independent person who could go out into the world.
As I made it through college and transitions to being an adult, I really started to appreciate my parents and what they had done for me. This has affected me my whole life, without them and how the were to me I would not be the person I am today.