My father died of lung cancer in November 2006. He was 59 years old. I was 19 at the time, away from home for college for the first time, and was fortunate enough to be able to come home and say my goodbyes. My father, though I loved him fiercely and still miss him with all my heart, was not the type of man to plan ahead most of the time, and I know it caused some fights between him and Mom, but they always managed to figure it out somehow.
I say this because of what I say next: my father died without a will in place. Nothing to tell us what, if anything, we'd be receiving once he left this world. I'll be honest: I didn't give two shits if he left me anything. At the time, I was too focused on the fact that I'd lost my father to care. I knew there wasn't any money, and I knew that any insurance would go to paying the funeral bills. Additionally, there was my little sister, who was only 13 to worry about. I didn't have time to worry about what'd I'd get from Dad's things.
The summer after he died, my mom pulled my little sister and I aside and told us that even though Dad hadn't left an official notarized will, he'd discussed with Mom and put down on paper some things he wanted his kids to have. She'd already given my older siblings their items while I was away at school, but wanted to wait until I was home to tell my little sister and I what we got.
My little sister got Dad's rifle and the pistol Dad had carried in Vietnam, a tiny little thing that looked about as threatening as a water gun. There were no bullets for either, and there hadn't been for a long time, which is why we managed to not shoot ourselves as children. Also, it was kinda hard to get to the rifle, since it had been buried behind all manner of things in the back of my parents' closet for years, and we hadn't known about the pistol until the summer before Dad died. I got Dad's car, something that annoyed my little sister to the point where I joked that if she wanted it, she could shoot me for it. I ended up selling the car for scrap money because when a mechanic took a look at it, he said it would be cheaper to buy a new car. Broke my heart to do it, and Wendy, my little sister, didn't speak to me for weeks before and after I did it. But I also inherited something else, something that, to me, was worth far more than any money I could ever get for it, because of what Dad's reasoning for leaving it to me was.
The other part of my inheritance were my father's 3 Beatles albums: Beatles For Sale, Beatles IV, and Yesterday...And Today.
I'd always known my father was a Beatles fan. Growing up, if the Beatles came on the radio, he'd refuse to change the station. Granted, he refused to change the station normally, but he'd be more forceful about it if there was a Beatles song playing. His first exposure to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was during Vietnam, when a barracks-mate had the vinyl and played it constantly, to the point where Dad and his fellow barracks-mates got sick to death of it and threatened to toss the soldier and his vinyl to the Viet Cong if he didn't give it a rest. In his later years, he was able to go back and listen to the album without getting sick of it. When I bought the VHS remaster of Yellow Submarine at age 13, Dad was the one who sat down and watched it with me, and who best put up with my repeated viewings. He knew all the words, and seemed just as amused by it as I was at the time. One of my favorite memories of my father is connected to the song "Hey Jude," but that's another story for another post.
Most importantly, my father encouraged my love of the Beatles at a time when I was taking a lot of shit from people at school for being open about my love of the Beatles. In my hometown, it wasn't cool to listen to the Beatles, and if you did, you kept quiet about it. I've never been the kind to keep quiet about my love for things (ask my friends who have to put up with my constant babbling about my love for Duran Duran), and I didn't realize that I was opening myself up to teasing. I had two other people in my grade who loved the Beatles, and were more than happy to talk about them with me, but they were considered "popular kids" and therefore immune to the teasing about it that I suffered. My father, in addition to threatening to kick the crap out of the bullies, made sure that I knew that there was nothing wrong with liking the Beatles, and encouraged me to learn as much about the band as I could.
I didn't know he owned any of their actual records until junior high. I was doing a presentation on The Beatles for English, and we were promised extra credit if we brought in props related to our subject. I had already packed my Yellow Submarine VHS and the songtrack CD when it occured to me that maybe my parents could help me further. So I asked my mom and dad if they could help me, and I was handsomely rewarded: my mom had three albums, all compilations, which we quickly deemed wonderful but not really good for my purposes. That's when Dad looked through his records and pulled out the three albums I mentioned above, and told me that he'd bought them when they were released and they were the musical purchase he'd always been the most proud of. I was amazed. There in my hands were 3 original Beatles albums, 3 things I never thought I'd be close to at all in my life. I brought them in for my presentation and guarded them with my life. One of the two people I'd talked about them with in elementary school asked if she could hold one, and my teacher encouraged me to pass it around. So I did, letting everyone know that they belonged to my dad and if they broke the record, he'd break them.
Years later, I sat on the couch with the three albums in my hands. I was 19 1/2, my father was gone, but he left me the albums that had been so important to him. When I asked my mom why Dad had left me the records, she said "When we discussed it, he told me that you would get the records because he knew that if he left them to your older siblings, they'd just sell them for money, and that Wendy wouldn't want them at all. He left them to you because he knew that out of all his children, you'd be the one who would properly appreciate them and love them."
Dad was right. Those 3 albums are some of my most prized possessions, and the start of what I hope someday becomes a larger record collection. For now, though, even though it's small, thanks to my father I have the greatest record collection in Pennsylvania.
"Though I know I'll never lose affection for people and things that went before, I know I'll often stop and think about them, in my life I'll love you more." - "In My Life" by The Beatles
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