The Sunday Memory Drawer - Christmas From and To Dad

Last week, I told you about the years where my family pretty much gave up on extensive Christmas shopping and I picked up the gauntlet...and dropped down the credit card.

Well, there was a short time towards the end of his life where my father, inexplicably and almost maniacally, got into holiday gift giving.  Oddly enough, I am still reminded of this every year by the United States Postal Service.  Because I still get the catalogs that my dad used to order from. 

I have never ever bought anything from two guys named Harry and David.  My father did.  I still get their holiday catalog.  I have never ever purchased anything from some place called Figis.  No worries.  My father did.  I still get their holiday catalog.  So, essentially, my dad's legacy to me is a virtual tracking of his buying power during the last five years of his existence.

The likes of Harry & David and Figis specialize in oddball gifts.  Like the pears shown above.  Baskets of other fruits too numerous to mention.  Salami.  Ham.   Chocolate.  Nuts.  Sour balls.  You name it.  The gift that just screams "the hell with your cholesterol, happy holidays!"  I can't imagine ever sending anybody a present of a perishable food that might not last until New Year's Day.

My father, however, did.  And, for those final years, he was a Christmas gift-giving machine.  He would sit in his recliner, mainly because the prostate cancer had migrated to the bone in his leg.  But that didn't stop him from going on a shopping trip.  Flipping through these catalogs and remembering all the folks he suddenly felt a need to buy presents for.

The mailman.

The superintendent of his apartment building.

His bartender.  Even though he was no longer visiting his local tavern, Dad couldn't forget all those beers that got poured a decade ago.

His bookie.  I kid you not.

I know the list of recipients because I was the one doing the ordering.  On a Saturday afternoon early in December, I'd go over to do the honors of translating Dad's order to Harry or David or Figis.  You see, I had the credit card.  My father did not.

"I don't need one.  And I don't want these people stealing from me."

But it's okay for me to give my credit card number to some faceless person on the other end of the phone. 

"You're young."

Oh.

So the annual process would begin.  My father had all his items, complete with the correct catalog number, on a piece of paper.  He would read them off and I would translate them to the sausage maker or fruit picker on the phone.

And my father would adopt annual gift themes, which meant he pretty much bought the same thing for everybody.  One year, all his friends were inundated with German summer sausages.   Because nothing says "Merry Christmas" more than a big hunk of processed meat. Another year, my father ordered nothing but cans of cashew nuts. Thank God nobody on his list suffered from diverticulitis.

I never quite understood what was behind this sudden frenzy of generosity from my father.   Maybe he knew the days were winding down.  Perhaps it was his way to try and recapture some holiday excitement of years past.  My dad never really displayed much emotion about anything.  And Christmas was, well, usually just some way for consumers to get conned and waste their money.  But, in those catalog years, my father came back to Yuletide life.  Starting in October, he would keep reminding me almost daily.

"And remember...the first Saturday of December.  You have to keep it open so I can do my shopping."

It gave him pleasure.  Who was I to quibble?

Of course, as I lamented last week, my annual Christmas present to my father became harder and harder with each passing year.  I certainly wasn't going to give him a box of apples or a year's supply of pepperoni.  As he endured his illness, he rarely left his home.  There was little he needed.  There was even less that he wanted.  And, frankly, I was running out of ideas.

And then there was his last Christmas.

The pain in his leg was so bad early in December that I had to have him hospitalized.  Although my father never shared the details of his doctor visits, the chemotherapy was obviously not working.  There was no "Catalog Saturday" that year.  Meanwhile, neither of us knew it at the time but Dad had also left his home for the very last time.

My father would always tell me that he had his doctor consultations under control. 

"When you need to know something, he'll call you."

Yeah, right.  He never did.  So, because I had a sense that this was all going downhill very quickly, I sought the doctor myself.  Naturally, he never called me back.   But, a social worker did on his behalf.

"Your father needs to be moved to a hospice."

Huh?

"Didn't the doctor tell you?  Your dad has only three months to live."

Er, no.

I was at work and looked at the calendar on my desk.  It was December 22.

Had the doctor shared this all with Dad?  I never really knew.  But, as I absorbed all this news, I thought about the inevitable.  The future.  And the present.

This would be my father's last Christmas.

And I still hadn't bought him a present. 

Why should I do?  I had never gone a single Christmas without giving my father something for the holiday.  But what this year?  A gift that will just keep on giving?  For three months, tops?

As conflicted as I was about the actual gift, I became more resolute than ever.  I would give my dad a Christmas present.  To do anything else would be an admission to me...and maybe him...that this holiday would be different than any other. 

Ultimately, the answer came to me in a divine fashion.  From God.  Or perhaps thanks to my sheer clumliness. 

As I was rounding up some personal items that he would need in the hospital, I quickly grabbed some toiletries out of his bathroom.  In my haste, I dropped his electric shaver onto the tile floor.

It shattered in pieces.

Ooops.  And thank you.

When I gave him a new shaver in the hospital as we celebrated Christmas in Mount Vernon Hospital, he asked me what happened to the old one.  I told him that I dropped it.

"You're always clumsy."

Yes, I am.   Right to the end. 

"I didn't get a chance to give you anything." 

Dad pulled out his wallet.  He had a one hundred dollar bill buried in its recesses.  It might have been there since Dwight Eisenhower was President.

"Go buy yourself something."

I told my father the same thing he told me every year.  I didn't need anything.

Dad had a stack of magazines on his hospital tray table.   He pulled one out from the bottom.

"Here.  Look in this.  They got some nice chocolate covered almonds."

It was the Harry and David catalog.

Dinner last night:  Pepperoni pizza.