Alone Again… Naturally
Father's Day
A Timestorm Epitaph
"I remember I cried when my father died, never wishing to hide the tears."
In 1971-72, I was the smallest, youngest player on Iona Prep's undefeated, un-scored upon "Fighting Irish" Frosh football team. The Irish Christian Brothers, former Marines, knew how to coach. With no late buses, my Dad or Mr. Morabito would pick us up and drive us 21 miles home.
My Dad, an accomplished basketball player, hoped I'd play basketball, but at "5 foot-nothin' and a hundred-and-nothin'," it was football. Despite my size, I held the school’s obstacle course record. My Dad was always there, watching.
Three songs played on every drive. From the car radio: “Shaft.” MAN! Did we dig that! Then there was “Bye Bye, Miss American Pie”… written by one of our fellow Iona Prep guys, Don McLean. We shared the same English Teacher, Mr. MulCahy, and analyzed Don’s lyrics in class one day.
Then there was “Alone Again Naturally” by Gilbert O’Sullivan. Never really paying attention to another Irishman writing a song or his lyrics, those words came rolling around. I felt something incomprehensible to a 14-year-old. It wasn’t simpatico for the future, it was feeling the loss of my Dad in the present. I’d look at him driving the car.
My Father would live another 44 years before dying on Father’s Day of 2016, but I felt his passing… always. He was born on 31 May, a Memorial Day, the same date of my first Son’s Rehearsal Dinner. The Trade Center was completed on my birth-date of 23 December, the same date Dominick Melillo was drafted into WWII. The Trade Center came down 24-minutes after my first Son was born on 11 September 2001.
Connections in time.
“I remember I cried when my father died
Never wishing to hide the tears
And at sixty-five years old. (My Mom was 72)
… And when she passed away
I cried and cried all day”
Her name was Carmel. I was in Carmel, Indiana, loading the car for a trip to Midwest when the phone rang. I went back once after that but now choose to spend those days at home.
Fifty-two years have passed since Iona football and the car radio. Today marks eight years since my Dad’s Father’s Day passing. What was once the Future and then the Present and then the Past is now the Present and the Past, and oddly, the Future again. That song plays over and over in my mind, truly a work of lasting… Timeless… Art.
Happy Father’s Day? If you have your Dad, go hug him. If there's a rift, let it go. Love him anyway. If you're going to be a Dad, love your kids as the parents who will one day give birth to the parents who will remember you after you've passed.
This is why I write pieces like "This Too Has Already Passed," "Timestorm," and from SYMPHONY V in progress, "... and soon the Future is Past."
When I was born, I had 11 grandparents. Father’s Day was cool. Today, I'm a little sad on Father’s Day... but "Remember the Future."
Happy Father’s Day.