My father… Jim… he wasn’t a religious man. Not in the way they sell you in the quiet, respectable pews on a Sunday morning. No. His religion was a different, older, and more goddamn honest one. It was the “Man Code.” I don’t know where he got it. Maybe from watching Steve McQueen, or The Godfather, or just from some quiet, forgotten corner of his own soul. But it was there, dipped in a beautiful, hard, and completely unapologetic masculinity.
And his “justice”? Christ. It was swift, and it was honest. He never hit you with a closed fist. That was for the street. But an open hand? That was the beautiful, ugly, and completely necessary tool of his fatherhood. We were boys, feral and stupid, and he ruled us. Not with empty threats, but with the quiet, terrifying, and completely credible anticipation of violence. You broke one of his rules, you fucked up, he’d grab you by the arm, bend you over his knee, and that big right hand would just… work. Your legs would be flapping, your butt cheeks tight as a goddamn snare drum, and he wouldn’t stop. He’d just keep spanking the shit out of you until you finally broke, until you cried.
You couldn’t be a “tough guy” with him. He’d just hit harder. He was breaking your pride. He was teaching you. And the second the tears came, the second you surrendered, it was over. He’d get down on his knees, look you right in your wet, snotty, kid-face and say, “You deserved this. Don’t do it again.” It wasn’t anger; it was a goddamn lesson. It was honest. And you know what? It worked. I never did that with my own kids. I used the fear of it, that quiet, inherited threat. But he… he did the work. He treated all three of us boys the same.
He was a character. I can’t even remember what he smelled like, not Old Spice or any of that other bullshit. Just… him. And the smoke from those little cigars with the wood tips, the kind I’d copy later. He was a drinker, a beautiful, honest, and completely functional one. He’d drink and drive, take us to Dodger games, to the movies, buzzed, maybe a little drunk, but always in control. He loved his motorcycle, looked like a goddamn king on it. Loved his guns, but never shot them. Loved his magazines, but never read them. He was a collector of things, of props for the man he wanted to be.
He was the one who moved us to Whittier, to that beautiful, phony, Ozzie & Harriet life in a quiet, respectable neighborhood. He was a good family man… right up until the moment he wasn’t. The drinking got louder. The yelling at my mother started. And I remember the cops, the quiet, ugly, and completely necessary end of the illusion. Two of them, holding his arms stretched out on the couch, and a third one, with a baton, just… pounding him. The short end, thud, thud, thud, right into his ribs. I was screaming. And he, in the middle of this beautiful, ugly, and completely honest display of state-sanctioned violence, he looked at me and said, “It’s OK, Jimmy. Get back in your room. It’s OK.”
He came back the next day, black and blue, a beautiful, ugly, and completely honest rainbow of failure. It was the prelude to the divorce. My mother, she was feral herself, she couldn’t play the part of the submissive, quiet wife. And he… he had his own lie. He had an affair with Barbara, his old high school flame. The “feminist epidemic” was his excuse. The truth? He just… did it.
But here’s the punchline. The beautiful, ugly, and completely redeeming part of the whole goddamn story. After the fire, after the divorce, after he blew up his own life… he never remarried. He sacrificed. His life became a quiet, lonely, and completely dedicated act of penance. His weekends were for us. His house was a goddamn storage unit, a museum of his old life, filled with the things he collected but never used. He worked nights at the Post Office, memorizing zip codes, and he lived on coupons. Two-dollar Tommy’s hot dogs. Three-dollar Carl’s Jr. He became this beautiful, strange, and completely hilarious character, with his shorts down past his knees, his socks pulled up to meet them, and his goddamn Velcro shoes.
And his pride? His real, honest-to-God legacy? It was us. Me and my brother, Nick. Two 300-pound, six-foot-four giants. He loved, loved, walking into a room with us. He’d put one of his big paws on our shoulders, and he’d just… swell up. He was the Godfather. He was the Alpha. And we were his beautiful, ugly, and completely terrifying proof that he had done something right.
And the man, that tough, hard, “Man Code” bastard… he was a good grandfather. A hundred bucks in a birthday card, every single time, for every single one of my kids. He’d come to visit, and I’d watch him. I’d watch him with my children, and I’d see this… light. This beautiful, quiet, and completely unconditional love that I’d forgotten he even had. And I’d have to walk away, go into the other room, because I’d feel my own goddamn eyes getting wet.
He was a blessing. He was a flawed, drunk, angry, and completely beautiful bastard. He was my father. And I’m thankful for the whole goddamn, beautiful, ugly, and completely honest mess of him.
