"What did you study at school?" I asked, noticing a large crumb clinging to the bottom of my Dad's left elbow. He laced his shoe - heel resting on the edge of his seat. He was wiry, weighing around 119 pounds. His legs were strong from repeated walks through the woods behind his trailer. Dad continued.
"We learned to read, write, and figure on slates and when we got older - quill tip pens and paper. A buddy and I dipped a girl's pigtails in his inkwell." "What happened?" "We got the switch - both of us!" Dad had a stylized laugh. I'd memorized it - the turned up corners of his mouth, his widened eyes, and the way he arched his eyebrows as though surprised. I learned that day that his schoolhouse chalkboard was made of black-painted wood and that his lunch often consisted of leftover breakfast. I had remembered singing patriotic songs in grade school. "Do you remember any songs from when you were young?" I asked. "We sang one at the end of every school day," he replied. "Really...would you sing it...do you remember it?" "Wait till I get my mouth harp." I couldn't believe my good fortune. Dad had seldom talked to me in any significant way and rarely shared family history. As he walked to the couch and sat down by his German-made Hohner, I remembered that years that passed since I'd heard him play. Dad blew a note, hummed in high tenor, and began to sing, It was wondrous to me - a happy accident! "Tis four o'clock by the cuckoo clock - cuckoo, cuckoo. And down the street come the children's feet - cuckoo, cuckoo. The school is over for the day. The books and slates are put away. The time has come for fun and play - cuckoo, cuckoo." I was about to respond when Dad interrupted. "Well, enough of that - here Peanuts. I better let this mutt out before we leave." That day had me taking my "quiet-nature" father to John's drugstore, with one "sweet" exception in an otherwise ordinary day.
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