We lunched today, my daughter and I, at the Hickory House, an
old timey kind of place down the street from our office and factory. The special
today was chicken fried steak with a choice of three sides: mashed potatoes, corn, green beans, soup, and
salad bar. My daughter ordered the special, and rebelling against common sense,
I got a hamburger with a package of potato chips.
We got to talking about my younger brother, and why he was
driven to recreate the estate of my grandparents that he knew as a child in
Decatur, Illinois. And, more to the point, why I was not. He was moved to
Oklahoma when he was five years old so most of his memories of the place were reinforced
by photos and stories. He grew up with a nostalgic idealized view of the place.
I did not.
So he ended up with a five acre estate, and I ended up never
buying a house in my life. He has gardeners, and a pool boy, and a place for
everything including his Porsche, Boat, and his other three vehicles. I have a RV that needs a new controller on the
hot water heater; the generator didn’t start the other day, and all the
furniture needs recovering. To be fair I should mention my apartment in Bogota,
Colombia, and the maid that comes in five days a week, but let’s talk about
that later.
I think my daughter might have recently read Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert T Kiyosaki.
She has been running our family business for the past several years. I think she
saw me as the poor dad representative. In my defense, actually, I didn’t have a
defense. I didn’t have a good excuse for not being the rich dad, but I thought
of myself as rich without the money.
“You could have been anything you wanted to be,” my aunt Marsha
used to say every time she saw me.
“And I have done,” I always replied. Her response was to
always shake her head, sigh, and walk away.
“I am educated, and that’s the reason I can’t do anything,” I
used to quote some Englishman whose name I can’t remember, and who obviously
was not a graduate of an English public school where too much education would
have not been an issue. But I do believe too much education may have given me too
many choices all of which I could have picked and did. I am still trying to decide on which to
dedicate myself. Now, at lunch with my daughter, I wasn’t so sure that being eternally
flippant was so good.
My brother picked early and stayed the course. Helpful too, he
choose a lucrative field in which to work. He specialized in endodontics, the
dreaded root canal, steadfastly for 24 years. I specialized in dabbling in work
mostly disguised as hobbies.
“Wait as long as you can,” my grandfather told me about 40
years ago. “When you are old, all you can do is work.”
“I took him at his word, followed his advice, and waited.” I
told my daughter between big bites of burger.
“You’re still waiting,” she laughed.
“Well, I am trying
to decide when to start up. . .,” I said with my mouth full.
“You’re 71 years old, Dad.” She laughed.
“I am almost old enough to start working then,” I swallowed,
wiped my mouth with a paper napkin, and laughed. “You want some pie for desert?”
