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Welcome to Stuff I Learned Yesterday. My name is Darrell Darnell, I think hunting and fishing is boring, and I believe that if you aren’t learning, you aren’t living.
Na einai kalytero anthropo apo ton patera toy. It’s a Greek phrase used repeatedly in the TV show Fringe which aired for five seasons from 2008 – 2013. My very first podcast covered that show and it was called The Fringe Podcast. If you haven’t seen the show, I highly recommend it, and I think the podcast makes a great companion piece to it. If you’ve seen the show, I recommend watching it again, this time with my rewatch podcast, The Fringe Podcast Rewatch, as your companion.
Ok, that’s all the self promotion for today.
That Greek phrase translates to, “Be a better man than your father.” The phrase centers around Peter Bishop and his father, Walter Bishop. I won’t spoil the show, but suffice it to say that Peter has daddy issues. Walther dearly loved Peter. There’s no doubt about that. Walter was a brilliant scientist, and often crossed moral and ethical lines in his experiments. He even conducted experiments on Peter when Peter was a boy.
So it’s no surprise that when we first meet the Bishops, Walter is isolated, living out the consequences of his experiments, and his relationship with Peter is estranged. Peter wants absolutely nothing to do with Walter. With this in mind, you can see how the phrase, “Be a better man than your father” is something that would connect with Peter.
I’m incredibly grateful for my dad. He wasn’t perfect, but he was such a great dad. I am who I am today in large part, because of him.
My dad taught me the value of hard work. He taught me to respect all people. He instilled values in me that taught me to treat the janitor with the same respect as the CEO. He taught me to always thank the person who provided the meal in front of me and he always made sure we had enough to eat. He taught me to work on cars, and I’ve been able to repay him by helping him fix his car a couple of times. He taught me to respect women.
One day about 10 or 15 years ago my dad called me up and asked if we could get together and talk. If you knew my dad, you’d know this would be alarming. My dad’s not a man of many words. I’m not sure that we’ve ever had a prolonged conversation. Much of what he taught me was done by living it out, not by sitting me down and trying to teach me a lesson.
So when dad said he wanted to sit down and have a chat, I assumed the worst. I assumed the cigarettes he’s smoked since he was 14 had finally caught up with him and that he’d received a diagnosis that we all dread. Later that day my brother called me and asked if I’d talked to dad. Apparently dad had called him and had the same conversation. My brother’s fears were the same as mine. And so we waited.
A few days later dad came by my house and picked me up. It was just the two of us. His conversation with my brother would also be one-on-one. He drove us down the street and found a parking lot with an empty spot and pulled in. He turned off the truck and we sat in silence. I could tell by the look on his face he was having difficulty forming the words he wanted to say. For only the second time in my life, I saw my dad cry.
I didn’t know what to do or say. I’m not sure if I did or said anything. But he gathered his composure and said, “Darrell, I’m sorry I wasn’t a better father.”
I was stunned. My first thought was, “What? That’s it? You’re not dying?” Then, in a flash my mind started racing through my childhood trying to think of what could have led him to the conclusion that he owed me any sort of apology for how he fulfilled the role of a father.
Again, I was stunned. There were certainly times where I wished dad had been more present or not yelled at us. I wish he and mom hadn’t divorced. But I had never once thought he was a bad dad or owed me any sort of apology for my childhood.
My brother and I got spanked by dad when we were kids, but I can’t think of a single time he spanked us without cause and I never thought he crossed the line into anything that could be considered abuse. As an adult, I’m glad he did it. We needed it. There was more yelling in our house than I would have liked, but it’s not like it was non-stop yelling. In fact, there was far less yelling than non-yelling. And every single one of us, myself included, share the blame on that. We kids did not make things easy on my dad and step mom and the family they were trying hard to hold together.
My dad took me hunting and fishing on regular occasions, which I hated. I wished he’d taken interest in things that interested me and done those things with me. But I eventually realized that hunting and fishing is what he loved to do when he was my age, and he was simply trying to spend quality time with me in a way that he thought was best.
Here’s what I learned.
I never met my dad’s dad. When you hear me talk about my grandpa, I’m referring to my dad’s step-dad. He’s the only grandpa I ever knew. He and my grandma married after my dad was grown and out of the house, but before I was born.
I don’t know how old my dad was when his mom and dad divorced, but his dad was never a part of my life. My dad has told me a few things about him over the years. What I know is he was an alcoholic and often drunk. I know he was physically and verbally abusive to my dad, his brother, and my grandma. My dad’s relationship with his dad was complicated and estranged.
From what I understand, my dad’s childhood was pretty horrific. When we were kids and complained that dad had spanked us, he’d sometimes reply by telling us that we didn’t know what abuse was. He was right. As I’ve learned more I understand why he didn’t speak of his dad much.
More recently I asked my dad about his grandpa, his dad’s dad. What he told me was more horrific than I imagined. He told me that his dad’s dad was also an alcoholic and he’d had a very rough childhood. He was verbally and physically abusive to my dad’s dad when he was a kid. One time, in a drunken fit of rage, he took a big stick and hit my dad’s uncle in the head with it. He hit his son so hard it nearly killed him. Perhaps it would have been better if he had. He suffered severe brain damage and never recovered. He spent the rest of his life in a state mental hospital.
In an unbelievable way, my dad’s dad, as horrible as he was, was a better man than his father. And my dad, by a long shot, was a better man than his father. My dad broke the generational chain of alcoholism, abuse, and fear.
Na einai kalytero anthropo apo ton patera toy. You did it dad. You did it.
Being a better man than our fathers should be the goal of each one of us. Whether our dad set a low bar or a high bar, we owe it to our families to not only be the best we know how to be, but to learn from others so we can be even better than we could otherwise be.
I have tried very hard to be an even better man than my father, and I hope with all that is in me that Colby is a better man than I am. This world needs more men actively engaged in their families and their communities. Young men need good role models. I’m so grateful for my dad and the example he set for my brother and I.
He owes me no apology. I owe him everything. Thanks, dad. I love you.
I’m Darrell Darnell, and this has been Stuff I Learned Yesterday.
I want you to be a part of the next Monday Mailbag on March 31st! Monday Mailbag is your opportunity to Share what YOU’VE learned, so that other listeners and I can learn from YOU. It can be a message as short as 30 seconds or several minutes long. It really doesn’t matter just as long as it’s something that will benefit others. You can send in questions or responses to my SILY episodes, and I’ll respond to them via Monday Mailbag episodes. You can send in questions or responses to my SILY episodes, and I’ll respond to them via Monday Mailbag episodes. You can participate in Monday Mailbags by visiting the Golden Spiral Media listener feedback page.