Posted by:
intellectualfeminist
(
)
Date: January 23, 2011 03:40PM
He told me yesterday that he was giving a talk, and that his assigned topic was sacrifice. I know, fun. So I asked what he was going to use for his 5 minute spiel, and he mumbled LDS.org.
Well, I decided to help him out a little. Since I left, my kids, who all have chosen to still attend, go to church with their dad & stepmom. I couldn't go today because I had plans I couldn't cancel, but I'll go to their ward occasionally if one of my kids is doing something, speaking, performing, etc. I don't support TSCC, but I DO support my kids, and we've had a good and open relationship as a result.
Anyway, to avoid having my son slog through 5 minutes of church propaganda on "sacrifice", I shared some lessons on sacrifice by telling my son about my father, the grandfather he never knew, the Catholic one on my side of the family history.
My dad and his sister were raised on a farm; by the time he was my son's age, my father practically did the work of a grown man. He got up early every morning to milk the cows and feed them, and when he got home, there were always more chores and homework to do. My dad loved sports, and in high school, he started playing basketball. He was a natural at it, and he soon got the nickname "Shifty Louie" because of his moves on the court. He was good, and could have been really good perhaps, but there's only one picture in one yearbook that shows him on the basketball team. His first big sacrifice came when he had to choose between being the best player on the team and continuing the winning streak foe he remainder of HS.......or getting up at the crack of dawn ever day and coming home again after school to do the work his ailing father was frequently unable to do. High school came and went, and suddenly, during my dad's senior year, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. My father & his parents had been saving money for him to go to college, and he stayed at home to work on the farm and do odd jobs to add to his college fund. More and more young men were joining the armed forces, and my father was soon faced with his second great decision: take the money He saved and go to school, or serve his country. He decided his country needed him more Han the university, and so he joined the navy and was sent to the Great Lakes Naval Training base north of Chicago. He became a radar technician, and though he never actually saw combat, he was willing to sacrifice not only his education but his life, it came down to it.
Finally, the war was over, and the GI bill came along to help young men like my father get the education they had missed while in service. With an honorable discharge and new possibilities, my father wanted to pursue an advanced degree and began at the University of the Pacific. Sadly, it wasn't to be. In December of 1947, his sister and only sibling died of cancer, a few weeks short of her 22nd birthday. Less than three months later, his father was dead; the years of heavy drinking had taken their toll on his system, and a mild heart attack finished the job. His mother was all alone and prostrate with grief; my father made his final sacrifice, gave up his dreams of the future, and came home to the farm for good. He did get a good job in the area and things did work out for him in many ways, but sacrifice was part of his generation.
These are the kinds of things and people I want my children to know about. This is as just as much their heritage as their dad's Mormon side of the family, and I refused to let my son demean the honor and integrity of true sacrifice by talking about obedience and tithing, scrubbing toilets or doing the temple hokey-pokey. His 5 minutes, and the 5 minutes of hose listening, will be well spent; not one thing hijacked or usurped by cult propaganda; just a simple 5 minute lesson on sacrifice, from the man my son was named for: Joseph Louis.
Thank you dad :)