It was 18 years ago today that my Dad passed away. He was on my mind all day and this evening. Perhaps that is why I could not sleep and now find my self pounding away at my keyboard (it sounds better than clicking away on my laptop doesn’t it).  In memory of him I am republishing a post from my old site that  I wrote for fathers day last year. I hope you enjoy it.

Charles Bronson

I was really alone for the first time in my life.  I was living in Maryland while doing a student coop for the Bureau of Census. Eighteen hundred miles from my family and a girlfriend  and renting a room from a total stranger. I found myself channel surfing one evening and stumbled upon an old Charles Bronson movie from his early days. When he appeared on screen I was taken aback by how much he resembled my father when he was young. It must have been a Charles Bronson marathon because later on I caught a more recent  movie of his and damn if he did not mirror my father in later life also. I missed him than as much as I do now.  Thinking about him now I realize that much like Charles Bronson’s characters my dad was an old school man.  The archetype of the strong silent hero. He was not a man of words but of action. Of course his actions were a little more sedate then vigilante justice , well except for the time he popped out of the family station wagon with his shotgun to confront some neighborhood vandals , but just as important none the less.

I can probably count on both  hands the number of times I remember that he told me he loved me. The number of times he showed me however would take a super computer to calculate. The only regret  I have involves something I told him when he was helping me move to DC after college. I thought I was grown up enough not to be called Danny anymore and I kindly asked him to call me Dan or Daniel.  I wish I would have kept my mouth shut. I would let him call me anything he wants to just to have him back.  I have gradually tried  let the guilt go as time has gone by, besides that doesn’t seem the kind of thing that Charles Bronson would have let bother him and my dad  continued to show me how to live , how to love and how to battle through life.

I  am still a little repentant these days and actually like it when people call me Danny. I would like to continue writing this  but well there seems to be something in my eye. Instead I will raise a glass of Scotch. To Casey and Charles Bronson.