farrandy

Due to *cough* over-whelming demand *cough* I submit for your perusal the stories I told about my Dad at his funeral.

I have, of course thought of several other stories since I wrote this, and doubtless will be thinking of others in the days to come, but I'll just leave it as I read it then.

Hope you enjoy them.



My Dad
A Few Reflections and Mostly-True stories by Randy Farran

We interrupt this very somber occasion so that I can tell you a few things about my dad, Ralph Roosevelt Farran.

Let me start with that middle name. Roosevelt. He never really liked it that much. I don’t think it was anything political; in fact politics was something that Dad didn’t talk about very much. Now that I think about it, that may be one of the reasons why so many people liked him. No, I think he didn’t care for the name Roosevelt because, well, it’s a real mouthful of a name to hang on a kid. But if you’re the son of Benjamin Franklin Farran, and you have uncles with names like George Washington Farran and Thomas Jefferson Farran, I guess the die has already been cast. At least he didn’t get stuck with a Franklin or a Theodore. He got just a plain old Ralph for a first name. A lot of people when they hear the name Ralph might think of that kid in the movie who wants a Red Rider BB gun for Christmas. I remember showing that movie to Dad not to long after it had come out, and he sat there laughing all the way through it. Then he went upstairs, rummaged around in the closet—and brought down a Red Rider BB gun that he’d gotten when he was a kid.

By the way, I would like to take this opportunity to thank Dad for breaking that naming tradition; considering when I was born I might have been Randall Fitzgerald Kennedy Farran. [looking at brother]. Don’t laugh, Rus; you could have ended up with the middle name Eisenhower.

Now, everybody here knows that dad was a real friendly guy. He’d talk to just about anyone. Sometimes he could talk a lot. I remember one Christmas the phone rang. It was a relative calling to wish the family a merry Christmas. Only problem was, it wasn’t one of our relatives. The guy at the other end of the line had dialed the wrong number. Dad talked to him for several minutes, so I guess he’d found a kindred soul.

Yeah, dad liked to talk. He could tell stories, sometimes over and over. Like the time he met Harry Truman. And…I don’t mean some relative named Harry Truman Farran either…but the actual President Harry Truman. Or the time he got to carry Lester Flatt’s guitar. If you don’t know who Lester Flatt is, well, I feel sorry for you. Let’s just say that Dad considered it an honor. He told me that story a lot. Never mind the fact that I was there when it happened. There was a time when he would start in on a story and I’d think “Oh, god, he’s gonna tell the story about the bucket of steam again!” This, by the way, is a very funny story about hijinks during his tour in the navy, but I won’t tell it right now ‘cause it’s kinda long. But after hearing it I don’t know how many times, I started to dread it. But then one day, it occurred to me that someday, he wouldn’t be around to tell those stories any more. I didn’t think that day would come so soon. After that, I just enjoyed hearing them…one more time. And now I wish I could again…one more time.

Sorry, I meant to keep things light. I just got off track for moment.

While he was in the navy, Dad met a beautiful girl serving ice cream at a soda fountain, one thing lead to another, and after his tour was up, they got married—a fact that I and my brother and sister are very appreciative of. They bought half of a duplex—the other half having been cut off and taken somewhere else (don’t ask me why; I’m still unclear about that myself), and Dad proceeded to make additions to it. First, he put a two car garage on it (and poured a driveway for it), never mind the fact that they didn’t have two cars at the time. Next, he put a second story on top of the garage, because by this time it was getting’ kinda crowded down below, what with three kids and a dog. Several years later, he started working on a large patio out back, but before he got finished, it had turned into a family room with about as much square footage as the original half of a duplex. He might have continued, but I think by this time he was running out of yard. He did most of this work by himself. He did have some help from mom and us kids because I don’t think he knew there were such things as child labor laws. Okay, I’m joking there. A lot of the time we were “helping” by “going and watching some cartoons and staying out of the way already!”.

After building onto the house as much as he could (without disrupting flight paths, anyway), Dad still liked to build things and could often be found out in his shop working on his latest project. Like the fold-up picnic table that has seen more than 40 Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners and I don’t know how many garage sales. Or the cases that he made for a mandolin I bought, or my autoharp. But whatever the project, one thing they all had in common was that Dad built things to LAST. Yep, everything he made was very durable, and by that I mean HEAVY. I think Dad may have working under the belief that the world was going to run out of its precious supply of gravity. But then who am I to judge; after all, nothing he ever made has drifted off into space yet.

Oh, yeah, I’m going to tell you a little secret a lot you might not know about Dad. There was at one time a television show that he would not miss. No matter what project we were working on around the house, if this show was on that night, everything had to be finished and all the tools cleaned and put away in time for the evening’s entertainment. What was this show? Gunsmoke? Nope. Columbo? No. M*A*S*H? Huh-uh. It was The Muppet Show. I think his favorite muppet was Miss Piggy. No, strike that. I know it was Miss Piggy.

Later on, Mom and Dad purchased a bit more land behind the house. I was afraid that the house was going to start growing again, but Dad decided to dedicate the extra acreage to growing a garden, specifically tomatoes. Dad spaced his cherry tomato plants so that he could drive his lawnmower between them, pull off a tomato and pop it in his mouth without stopping.

Yeah, dad liked to eat. He liked to cook too, and he was pretty good at it—as long as he didn’t have roof over his head. Outdoor grilling, he was fine, but for some reason, his culinary skills failed when he walked through the door. I remember a time when Mom was sick and Dad cooked all the meals for us kids. He had made breakfast for us and Mom came downstairs and Dad complained about what picky eaters we were. Mom looked uneasily at the… crispy eggs…and runny bacon… and said something like, “Maybe they’d like it better if it was cooked.”

Now, I won’t say that everything that Dad cooked was inedible, but it was…an adventure. One day Dad and I were home by ourselves and Dad asked me if I’d like a Reuben sandwich. I told him that sounded good. When he was done fixing them, he called me in to eat. Now, at the time that this happened, I was old enough (and polite enough) to not point out that when most people make a Reuben sandwich, they use rye bread and not white, thousand island dressing, and not mayonnaise, Swiss cheese, and not cheddar, and corned beef, as opposed to ground beef. I guess he thought that Reuben sandwich was defined as: “a grilled meat and cheese sandwich with sauerkraut on it”. It was still pretty good though, even if it only had one ingredient right out of five. Guess that proves I’m not that picky an eater after all.

Well, I think I’ve had enough fun at Dad’s expense, so I’ll leave you with a couple of last thoughts. First, Dad’s last moments were spent with a cup of coffee in his hand and a dog in his lap. I can’t think of very many better ways to go--provided the dog in question isn’t a Great Dane or a St. Bernard or some such. That might be uncomfortable.

My final thought is this: I live in Tulsa now, and the local newspaper has for the past year been daily printing quotes from Will Rogers. The day after Dad died, ironically, this is the quote they printed. Just a few words that say it so much better than I can:

“What constitutes a life well spent, anyway? Love and admiration from your fellow men is all that anyone can ask.”

One of the first books I ever bought was Ray Bradbury's THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES. I think I had bought some STAR TREK books before that, but THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES was my first, well, -real- book. It was there that I think I first really fell in love with reading; when I first realized how beautiful language could be. I could say a lot about the the man and his books (though maybe the last sentence says all that needs to be said), and I think that it's already being done by others who are far better wordsmiths than I. But I will pass on a few thoughts.

I have a short piece by Bradbury titled "Tricks! Treats! Gangway!" that I pulled out of an old Reader's Digest. It is the recollection of Halloween in 1928 and if I ever get hold of a time machine, I want to go back to then and spend that wonderous holiday (before it became so commercialized)--provided that I too get to be eight year old-- with young Ray and his decidedly weird family.

He is the only one of the GRAND OLD MASTERS that I got to see and hear in person. He was getting some award or something at the Tulsa Library and was giving a speech that was free to attend. He was delightful, charming and very funny, not to mention the very definition of a gentleman. I took a couple of his books with me thinking that I might get them autographed. I'm not much of an autograph seeker, but hey, the guy who turned me onto reading? At least I'd have that to say to him. Anyway, I wasn't sure if there would be just a few people there or hundreds. Turned out to be the later, and I decided that it was unlikely he would be sitting there long enough to sign all of the books that people were lining up for, so I let it go. Sorta kicking myself for that now, of course.

The last few years I have made it a tradition to spend most of October reading creepy stuff. Bradbury usually gets represented by at least a few short stories. Last year I re-read SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES. It had been so long since I read it that I had forgotten just how scary that book is. Not nightmare inducing, just feakin' creepy. If you haven't read it and want a nice, fun little scare, give it a go.

I guess that's about it. It's just sad knowing that he won't be around anymore, but that sadness is countered by knowing how richer my life has become because of this man. I think I'll spend the rest of the evening revisiting some dead Martian cities.

We went to see THE HUNGER GAMES today. I can't say how good an adaptation it is, as I haven't read the book, but enjoyed the movie aside from some occasional jerky camera work. Good performances all around. I may just have to read the books.

So, yesterday I commented on someone else's LJ that I felt gyped because I had slept right through my first earthquake (the one that happened early Saturday morning). The fact that I slept through it isn't all that surprising in that as a kid I slept through the the neighbors house catching on fire and and all of the subsequent firetrucks, sirens and yelling (Really! Couldn't figure out why every other member of the family looked so haggard the next morning).
Anyway, Last night, I was sitting there reading the latest Terry Pratchett novel with the TV on waiting for the news to come on with the sound muted. I was waiting for the news because I had gone to the Occupy Tulsa Rally yesterday and I wanted to see if the local news actually covered the event. The sound was muted because the news was an hour late because of some goddamned effing football game! [can someone explain to me why a game that is supposed to be an hour long and actually takes FOUR GODDAMNED HOURS to play is considered exciting?...but I digress]. Anyway, the game is finally over, the news comes on, and the first story is the earthquake that happened earlier in the day...when suddenly the house starts shaking. I mean really bloody SHAKING! It felt like one of those really close, loud thunderclaps that shake the whole house but with no big noise and it just keeps going on for about a minute. Barb had just gone to bed but she was jolted out by the shaking and we stood in an archway just in case. We were somewhat ah...shaken...by the experience, as were the folks on the local news, I might add. Current estimates are that it was a 5.6 which is record for Oklahoma.
I've heard people from the west coast wonder how we can live in an area with all of the tornadoes we have 'round these parts. Well, all I have to say is that at least with a tornado you usually get some warning (unless, ah, you manage to sleep through it). But it's great to know that along with tornadoes, torrential flooding, blizzards and ice storms, we now have to worry about earthquakes as well. I -THINK- we're safe from tsunamis at least, but if there's one that could get us in Oklahoma, I don't think there's much else we'd NEED to worry about.
So I can now say that I have experienced an earthquake and quite frankly the cost can have 'em.
Earthquakes! Been there, Done that. Now where's my damn t-shirt?

[Previously on Farrandy's Livejournal: Randy was getting himself psyched up to have a FREAKIN' NEEDLE SHOVED INTO HIS SPINE.....]



So, we went in yesterday (Wednesday) morning so I could have FREAKIN' NEEDLE SHOVED INTO MY SPINE (See? It didn't do ya any good to skip over the "Previously on..." bit). It was pretty much identical to when Barb had the same procedure done to her neck last week. First they came in a stuck the FIRST &*&$#@ NEEDLE into the back of my hand (this is for the pain killer before the stick the FREAKIN' NEEDLE IN MY SPINE, so I'm actually sorta grateful for that one, but somehow on the back of the hand is just, I dunno, disturbing for some reason [and I mean despite the fact that it's a NEEDLE]). So after sitting in this room for about twenty minutes, reading the paper (trying to ignore the fact that there is a LONG CYLINDRICAL POINTY THING in the back of my hand [thought you might be getting tired of seeing the word NEEDLE in all caps...ooops!]), they take me back into this other room where the background music was Bill Wither's "Stand by Me" (considering I don't expect to be to sure on my feet afterwords, the line "We all need somebody to lean on" seemed appropriately ironic). They laid me on a table with a hole in it and a cushion for your face like a massage table (probably trying to lull one into a false sense of security, but I knew what was coming) and proceeded to stick the -THE- NEEDLE into my SPINE.

Barely felt it actually, and better still, couldn't see it at all. It didn't take long; "Stand by Me" had finished and they had me out of there before the next song was finished. It was REM doing "Stand". I swear I am NOT making this up.

They took me back to the first room wear Barb was still waiting with my coat my wallet and my book (fortunately no one had tried to mug her while I was gone; not that there was any money in the wallet, but I wasn't finished with the book). I sat there for a while and amused myself by being nauseous. When I got tired of that they said I could go.

Barb took me home via a route that seemed to have a lot more turns, bumps and dips than I remember it normally having, I and I sat down in the rocking chair for a few minutes before deciding that going to bed might be a good idea (okay, Barb thought it might be a good idea in that I looked like I was going to fall out of the chair, so I agreed with her).

I did that thing, got up a couple hours later, ate some food (which happily stayed where I put it) I wandered around the house thinking that it sure is blurry in here and then went back to bed for a couple more hours. Got up because, wouldn't ya know, the painkiller was wearing off, had a little more food, read for a little bit and went to bed.

Woke up today, kinda achy and stiff but as the day wore on, I got to feeling better. Still some pain in the hip and leg, but it already seems to be better that it was a couple of days ago. I plan on going in to work tomorrow. Thanks everyone for your good wishes.


[See, this is why I don't LJ very often: writing this shit takes a long time 'cause I tend to run on and I doubt that it's that interesting anyway]

Hi! Found this and had to pass it along. It's too good not to.

BTW, Ray Bradbury has seen it and liked it (but then what guy wouldn't like a hot chick singing about his books...or *ahem* him?).

Someone please tell me again how the Republicans -AREN'T- the party of the rich.

Just a quick cartoon...RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES!

This is Esme....



She is our youngest dog (around 8 months), and was a rescue from the animal shelter. She was listed as a corgi mix, and judging from the ears and face, corgi seems to be at least half of the mix, but the other half is anyone's guess (I bring your attention to that tongue, which is not an exaggeration: it doesn't fit in her mouth a lot of the time, and so is very un-corgi).

We named her after Esme Weatherwax from Terry Pratchett's Discworld books, because she is remarkably strong willed. While she is very smart, unlike her namesake, she doesn't seem to have a great deal of sense (continuing to pester the other dogs or trying to steal their food when they have made it very clear that they don't like this). But she's still a puppy and may grow out of this.

*Sigh* We keep telling ourselves that....

Her hobbies include (aside from those already mentioned) playing tug of war, running around the house like a lunatic, trying to get into places she shouldn't and helping us to get rid of stuff she doesn't think we need anymore.

I originally drew this one a couple of months ago (I think when I heard about how the insurance companies were cheating the families of fallen soldiers from the benefits they were due), and got sidetracked. The other day I heard about how these wonderful institutions are making up for the money they'll now lose by not being able to disallow people for having pre-existing conditions (which means just about anybody) by simply no longer offering child-only coverage, and I remembered the cartoon still in the sketchbook...