My Dad‘s Legacy
Reflections on Father’s Day 2024
My dad died last year on July 24, a month before his 88th birthday. I hadn’t seen or spoken to him in nearly 18 years. We were estranged and lived in different countries.
As Father’s day approaches, I reflect on what I learned from being raised by him.
Hard work pays off
My dad was a very hard worker all his life. Extremely conscientious, the only day I can remember him being late for work was the day the school bus failed to show up and he drove me to school himself. He worked as a refrigeration and air-conditioning engineer and ran a unit for a government housing department in Nigeria for over 15 years, managing a team who supplied and maintained refrigerators and air conditioners.
He had graduated with an engineering diploma from night school while working during days in England in the early 60s. He took the opportunity to migrate to the newly independent Nigeria with his wife — my mother — and young family in 1964 — little knowing that war would break out the following year.
He left for work every morning around 7:30 am, returning like clockwork at 5pm. I don’t remember him ever taking a sick day.
And he played as hard as he worked — excelling in everything he turned his hand to. Despite being self-taught, he was for many years the snooker club champion in Kaduna — the town in northern Nigeria in which we lived.
He taught me that you could learn anything if you put your mind to it, and that mastery was just a matter of time.
Dad ended his working life in the United States where he was well respected as a chief refrigeration engineer for many years at the MD Anderson Cancer Centre in Houston, Texas.
Honesty is the best policy
My dad was what you call unflinchingly honest — he was known at his workplace for never having taken a bribe. This may have been more about his fear of authority and the law — but whatever the reason it made him stand out. He was also very honest in his business dealings, perhaps to the point of naïveté. He gifted me a bank account when I got into university in 1981 which he had held for over two decades as a current account – so no interest. I was grateful yet annoyed that it could’ve been more!
Discipline as a habit
My dad was an extremely disciplined man. He definitely took seriously the adage ‘cleanliness is next to Godliness.’ Perhaps because of his early experiences when he was left with relatives in Grenada as a pre-teen when his mother went to join her husband in Aruba. Dad told us he learned from his new adoptive parents — his mother’s sister and her husband — to work hard and stay clean.
Although I am no way as disciplined as my dad, I do understand that routine makes life easier.
Tough love
Dad was one of those post slavery West Indian men from the Caribbean who was raised with punishment and reward—stick and carrot. He obeyed the rules and could not understand others who did not.
Unfortunately my two brothers — raised in a different time and place — behaved in ways he did not approve of and when they did, they got ‘licks’ — beatings with hand or belt.
My mother often intervened but could not always rescue them.
I myself only suffered his wrath once in my rebellious youth, getting a beating aged 15 when I snuck out of the house to go to a party my parents refused me permission to attend. I learned never to disobey him again.
Was he the perfect father? Absolutely not. I would say he was too strict — especially with his sons. Yet to this daughter he gave a sense of self-worth that has stayed with me throughout my life, especially in troubled times.
I will always remember that he left his home in Texas to spend two weeks with me in England when I had a nervous breakdown and was suffering from postnatal depression in 1987. It meant the world to me.
Nature and nurture
My love and appreciation of nature definitely comes from my dad. He was one of those green-fingered people that can seemingly raise plants in dry, arid soil — and he did. I can still see him in my mind’s eye, every evening watering the dry and sandy soil to keep his plants growing. I also remember the sweetcorn he would send us out to pick then grill on an open barbecue. He would take me around the garden to show me how the plants were doing, and we’d pick peas together to shell for dinner.
Every month or so we’d drive to the Kaduna river for a walk. I loved those walks and I’ve never forgotten the fern he showed me which closed when touched — Mimosa Pudica — it’s probably the only Latin plant name I know to this day.
Epilogue
While dad was alive I‘d always send him a message on Facebook on special occasions like Father’s Day and his birthday without expecting a response as I often didn’t get one. I treasured the few times he would respond, as he did when my mother died — by then they were divorced.
I still feel sad that I remained estranged till his death from the man who helped make me the woman I am today. Yet, I also have that pragmatic streak from him that tells me all is well — it may not be the way I’d have liked it to be — but such is life. It is what it is.
While my dad didn’t give me life — he was not my biological father and adopted me when he married my mother in 1964 — he gave me a fantastic childhood. A springboard from which I have today a great life that I love — I remain grateful to him.
Whoever your father is — whether he is with you or not — I hope you can raise a glass to him on Father’s Day and say Thank you, dad, I love you.
I know I will.
©marla bishop 2024
Marla Bishop is a relationship coach, writer and editor of TBI and Lilith. Currently convalescing at home with autoimmune condition myasthenia gravis, she dreams of travel, wellness and young people who do what they’re asked. Music, writing and fellowship keep her sane(ish).
