This is the story that was told to me, by my father. Keep in mind my father also claims to have invented pie, velcro, sliced bread, and shoes, and from time to time claims to know where Jimmy Hoffa is buried. My father was the first man to be granted full-custody of his three minor female children and granted child support, although my father never pushed the child support.
This is my story, and I have never claimed to have invented anything!!! My dad was a diesel mechanic. He worked long, hard days that ended with him coming home, drinking a couple of beers, and falling asleep in the chair. My mother was more of a social person and resented being stuck in the house all the time. In 1975 my mother decided that she was going to run away from home. A moving truck backed up to the small house and she and a group of movers proceeded to remove almost everything from the home. As the truck pulled away, her three daughters stood in the middle of an empty living room unclear what had just happened. My oldest sister was 11 at the time and became the mother of the house, I was nine and the co-mother, and the baby was 4 and we allowed her to continue being the baby. For years this is how we were: Dad would work, drink, sleep, and we handled everything else. Then Dad’s sisters decided that he needed to get out in the world and find those girls a momma!!!! So now the new normal was: Dad went to work, showered and headed out to hunt women. We were now 16, 14, and 9 and pretty much have been raised like feral cats. We were good kids; went to school and were never in trouble with the law. My dad came home from the hunt!!!!!! With his prize! She had three children 19, 17, and 5. In an effort to blend the families slowly, my dad moved into her home and left us at our house. After about a year or so, her two oldest children had moved out and my oldest sister was getting married to her boyfriend who was joining the army. So it was the perfect time to join the families together. My oldest sister and I had grown to be strong, independent young ladies and we were very protective over the baby. So you can see this was not a smooth transition. My older sister went on to be stationed with her new husband, I was sent to Tennessee for reasons I will not go into, and the baby was left behind with that woman. My father fell into a state of comfort blindness. Two, long years had passed before my older sister was able to free the baby from that woman. I was in Tennessee trying to complete high school, work and survive. We always understood that our dad loved us and did what he thought he needed to do. We were all distant from dad and his new family. We never cared because we had each other. Then when his second wife became ill, my two saintly sisters took on the task of helping dad care for her until she died. With her gone and me having moved back to Indiana with my own, young family, we began building the relationship with our father. Thirty years later my dad is a frail old man that is living in his home being cared for by his three female children. I sit with my dad while he tells me stories that don’t include my sisters and me, but he doesn’t remember that. My sisters are extremely close to this day. My dad is the father of three, strong, independent, good-hearted, law-abiding, productive citizens that will love and care for him for the rest of his days.
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