Tears for my Dad

I searched for him everywhere. I sought out his friends. I googled his name. I wanted to have him back. My Dad.

Dad went in for the umpteenth time for dialysis. At three times a week, four hours a day, six years – he had dialysis for 730 days of his life, 2,920 hours. And now he was being told they had run out of veins for his dialysis. It was Friday, December 10, 1993. It was my son’s 21st birthday; my Army child, stationed in South Korea. Dad decided not to go back to the center where he spent all those long grueling hours. He chose to die now rather than months from now, under all the same four hours a day, three days a week routine. He died on December 19.

I came home after spending the last week of his life with him and did mundane things, like shop at Albertson’s for milk and bread. All the while thinking that surely the clerks, the other shoppers, the children in the child seats, the baker, the butcher, the florist – would all see the pain in my eyes, the ache of my heart, the hole in my soul. Surely they noticed. I wanted to go up to each one and say “Did you know my Dad?” “Did you know he died?”

I went to his friends and would touch their hands, knowing that their hands had shaken my Dad’s hand. I knew that their hands had affectionately clapped my Dad’s shoulder or embraced him. And I would eagerly and breathlessly wait for anything they would say about my Dad. I wanted to confirm all the good things I knew about my Dad. I would stand there, soaking up his friends’ words like water on a parched throat.

“Your Dad was very kind.”
“Gentle”
“Warm.”
“Intelligent.”
“He was so important to me.”
“Your Dad loved you kids so much.”

All these words would bathe over me and sooth me.

Recently I have watched various news blogs about local people who have met untimely ends in freak accidents and what struck me were how many relatives who had never commented on these blogs, now were writing. They were writing in response to remarks made by various bloggers who didn’t know their lost loved one, and the remarks were sometimes hurtful, tacky, or erroneous. These loved ones have written from Ohio, California, Seattle – outside the scope of Spokane, Washington. And these loved ones have expressed the pain of reading these remarks when all they were doing was what I had done – they searched for anything about their child, their mother, my Dad. They googled their loved one’s name. They wanted anything about their loved one. Just like I did with my Dad. Any positive word to say he was loved by someone else. That someone else misses him as much as I.

Four months ago a good friend’s 24-year-old daughter passed away due to cystic fibrosis. I wrote about it on this blog – in a good way, in a positive way, highlighting what I knew about his daughter from my own experiences with her. I have a comment tracker and I have been amazed that every day, every single day, I have received hits to that particular post, from all over the world. Her friends started commenting to me – that it helped them so much to handle their grief over the loss of their friend. Her mother contacted me. She too wanted to hear that people loved her daughter as much as she did. The loss of her daughter took her breath away with its nearly unbearable anguish. She wanted comfort, she wanted to see her daughter through others' eyes. It confirmed for her that her daughter was vital to many, many people. That particular site gets two dozen hits a day. All because I said kind things about a person that was loved by so many people.

I wrote that story because I desperately wanted someone to write about my Dad in the same way. I wanted someone to say they loved him too. They missed him. They were sorry for my loss.

The empathy I get from others has healed the gaping hole I had felt for months after my Dad died.

Hopefully my treating others as I wish they would treat me makes a difference.

.

Tribute to a Newspaper

There used to be two newspapers here in Spokane until one folded in the mid-80s. Recently the remaining paper has experienced huge layoffs, 25% of the staff that skated past the last layoff 11 months ago, got their tickets this week.

I want to offer a Eulogy of sorts, a tribute and acclamation of Spokane's The Spokesman Review and its entire staff, a tribute to the former Spokane Daily Chronicle, and praise for all newspapers everywhere, as the technology age of the internet erodes away the benefits of news print on paper, books, magazines, the ability to READ.

I have been in the newspaper world since I was born. My Dad graduated from the University of Idaho in journalism in 1948. I was born and we moved from Moscow to Lewiston where Dad made his debut as a reporter at the Lewiston Tribune. His friendships grew to include all the Tribune writers, photographers, linotype operators.

There is a story of when my dad invited the newsroom staff to his house for a cocktail party. All were young (in their 20s) and all brought their wives. Everyone put their hats in the hall closet and all the women put their purses on the closet floor. Fine times were had and people left giggling and slapping each other on the back.

Next day all the men, and I mean all of the men, showed up to retrieve their hats and their wives purses.

There was a family feeling, an open invitation to barbeque and play games in the park kind of feeling.

Dad got an offer from The Chronicle when I was six (1955) and we caravanned with a couple other families to Spokane – one, Bob Larrigan, started at The Spokesman Review, Dad (Don Rice), started at The Chronicle. Same building. Same owners.

I spent many, many hours at the paper building. Many field trips were taken to the paper simply because my Dad was a reporter. Another student was the son of a reporter for The Review (Petty – can't remember the first name). We would tour both areas and end up in the printer room where a man would make all our names out in individual lead "stamps." I still have mine.

The friendships continued to grow involving both papers. It was a great life.

My dad was a true "investigative reporter" and would often work very closely with cops, attorneys, and judges. He investigated as good as any of the best PI's around. There was a long history at the papers for honesty, integrity, and printing the truth. They lived by that old standard, "who, what, where, when, why, and how." They answered each one diligently, honestly, truthfully.

[From a blog I posted at earlier in the day:]

My dad was one of the editors of The Chronicle. His name was Don Rice. Any article with his byline was considered factual and objective. He worked there from 1955 to 1982. He was well respected by all media outlets in Spokane, including the Spokesman. Interestingly, his friends included both papers, all television stations, cops, lawyers, and judges. He was known for his integrity and objective approach to news. He was a reporter first, a writer second. He was my hero and a giant in my eyes. I adored him and looked up to him. He passed away in 1993. I wept when The Chronicle closed. You do know that the two papers were owned by the same family - the Cowles. I don't remember a competition between the two; they each had the opportunity to scoop before the other just because of timing. There was a lot of old news in The Chronicle from events the night before, just as there was a lot of old news in the Review from events from the morning before.
When I was in school, we would take field trips to The Chronicle/Review building. It had a beautiful elegant hallway that stretched from Sprague (Chronicle) to Riverside (Review). There was a kid in my class throughout grade school whose father did the sports section for the Review. We never seemed to pick sides, we simply went through both papers and had a great time!
There is nothing like the drumming of several people typing on ancient Royal typewriters on half sheets of paper, the humming of the teletype as the keys seemed to tap dance their urgent message. I was fascinated with that place.
Today, it is very sad that the Spokesman is letting go 25% of their staff. I relate to this very well, because 18 months ago my office did the same thing. We are still recovering from that, the loss of friends, losing floor space to other tenants, trying to adjust to Dilbert-like cubicles, and trying very hard to regain the camaraderie and sense of purpose we left behind.

So – here's a tribute to you, Spokesman-Review and to your wonderful people. You all have carried the torch that my father once carried. With dignity, respect, honesty, and integrity. Your marble hallways will be less noisy but the echoes of all the people who have passed through your halls is lingering still. The smell of my Dad's vanilla tobacco still leaves hints in the air. I can still see the giant paper rolls turning and gliding and getting printed every single day with great news, columns, comics, recipes, announcements of births, weddings, deaths. Every year there was a story for kids for the month of December that I clipped and saved. All of my siblings read the paper, really read it, because our Dad's name was a byline every day. All the writers, reporters, photographers, machine operators, all were celebrities!