Something About Dad and Me

Dad was in the insurance business for a time.

He did claims, and then was appointed to

sign up agents for a large provider. He even

had his own agency for a while, but for some

reason unknown to me, that didn’t work out

so well.

After his divorce from my mom, Dad bounced

around from job to job. As a 14-year old, I lived

with my Dad. We moved from St. Louis to Kansas

City to get a new start.

Those were rough beginnings for the both of us,

Dad looking for work, and I having no friends,

trying to adjust to big city apartment living, and

a strange new school. Why even the KC police,

uniformed in tan and brown rather than blue

took a lot of getting used to.

I had culture shock seeing yellow public transit

buses rather than the St. Louis red. And I

thought moving from a National League

Baseball town to city with an American

League team was a downright disgrace.

Dad wound up getting a sales job at a local

Chevrolet car dealership. It seemed a natural

for him. He had the gift of a broad toothy smile

and a firm glad-handed shake he could turn on

at will. I was always amazed to see him in action.

Even during those often down-hearted and

depressing days, Dad could pour on the charm

when in the presence of other people. The

Dad I knew when we were alone tended to

be gloomy, depressed and quiet much of

the time.

My dad taught me a lot back then. I learned

how to shave from him, how to tie a tie, shine

my shoes, unbutton the middle button of my

suit jacket before sitting down, clean and trim

my own finger nails, comb my hair with a

straight and even part on the left side, give

a firm handshake to people I would meet.

But I never could manage to turn on that

big toothy smile quite like Dad could. You

see, I had crooked front teeth which em-

barrassed me. And although Dad managed

to make enough money on car commissions

and draws to pay the rent and put food on

our table, we never had quite enough left

over to get my teeth fixed .

And besides, the Kansas City Athletics sucked

as an American League baseball team. Who

in their right mind could fake a big old smile

after all that?

                         -30-

Chris Hanch 8-5-2020