Pictorial Memorial for my Dad...

Cmp1

BANNED
Wanted to mention to you that we used a bacteria that ate petroleum in our well tanks, it was called Liquid Alive,,,, kept down on the smell of the Drip,,,,, highly flammable mixture byproduct of the wells,,,,, worked extensively well,,,,, these were gas wells but produced drip and oil,,,,,
 

mrs. hornet22

Beach Dreamer
Wow! That last part hit REAL close to home. :cry::cry::cry::cry:

Thank you for sharing your story. I have completely enjoyed it.
 

mrs. hornet22

Beach Dreamer
Dad sold his million dollar property for 4 million dollars. He settled in at home for a few years with Sally and she got sicker and sicker. He had had a knee replacement and t i a stroke, so he's golfing and gambling days were over he had a bad case of CRS (can't remember snot). After Sally passed, he was too proud and stubborn to accept regular help and company around the house. You lasted on his own about 2 years until he had a substantial stroke. The doctor had given him a couple of sample bottles of Eliquis to change over his blood thinner from Warfarin. He took them home and started taking the Eliquis but did not quit taking the warfarin. The stroke did not affect his physical movement too much but gave him a real case of word salad. He could say lots of words, but could not string together anything cohesively. Immediately moved in on him to take care of what the doctor call ' four M's'. Money, Meals, Medication, and Mobility. I added a fifth M. Mutts! Dad had two Shih Tzus that it been with him a long time. Their care was probably the toughest part of my 2-year stay. (I looked it up; their Chinese breed name means 'eat ****s for dessert'!) Dad remained extremely pleasant and jovial. He was never angry or sad or cross in any way. He thanked my wife and I for what we were doing regularly. He also told me that he was tired of the waiting and just wished he could go on. His stroke effects of gradually subsided and left him with virtually zero effect after a few months. But he still couldn't remember who he just talked to on the phone or who was playing the ball game he just finished watching.
In February, he took a bad fall in the early morning while trying to manipulate the TV buttons because he couldn't find the remote. He broke his shoulder and fractured his pelvis. Then spent a week in the hospital and three weeks in rehab. In the hospital, he was diagnosed with stage-4 cancer on his liver and his lungs. Cholangiocarcinoma had originated in his bile duct. He decided that he did not want to treat, but let things take their natural course. He had a well-thought-out will and living will. I was his medical power of attorney.
Although he had bought that the idea for 4 years, we were finally able to convince him to enter an assisted living facility. This was necessary it's Dad and I have had a verbal contract that stated that when he could no longer do the paperwork in the restroom, it would be time for more professional help than I could give. (Ha.) Even though he was virtually bed-bound, he did enjoy his new place. He could barely transfer from his bed to his easy chair once every day or so. I was there daily, breakfast, lunch, and dinner/bedtime to make sure he was well taken care of. Fortunately for me he was able to easily afford this expensive care (and afford for me to pay outside help to come in and relieve me on weekends during the entire 2 years). In May, he had a second stroke very similar to the first that he never recovered from. During therapy, I'm nurse therapist asked him if he could remember his name. He had a confused look on his face as he shook his head 'no'. When the nurse asked if he remembered who I was, he croaked out the words, "My son,"and gave a little smile. Other than "thank you for what you are doing," these were the last cohesive words I ever heard him say.
But his easy going and jovial personality never faded. ALL of his doctors, nurses, and caregivers always adamantly remarked about his attitude and that he was their favorite patient. After returning to his bed in Assisted Living from the hospital stay with the recent stroke, my wife and I were bedside taking off the plastic hospital bracelets and a half dozen or so bandages did he had stuck on his hairy arms. My wife was carefully and slowly peeling the bandages out of his hair and I told her to "just snatch those things off! That's the way Dad would do it!" As she scoffed at me and continued her slow process, dad let out of painful gasp. She jumped back raising her hands and saying, "I'm so sorry! I'll try to be more careful!" Dad immediately starting in with a belly laugh that was so ferocious I thought he was going to hurt himself!
He passed on May 30th with my wife and his other daughter in law and myself outside of his room. I had arrived on the scene upon the hospice nurses notice to find those two tearing and whining around the room as dad was obviously down to his last minutes. I am out sadly that we had to give Dad some privacy and not stand around there watching him draw his last breath. The three of us retired to the waiting room. Within 5 minutes the hospice nurse came out and said that he had passed. She said that as soon as we left the room dad came out of his three-day state of non-responsiveness and asked if everybody was outside. She said that when she told him yes, he seemed comforted and relaxed, and took his last few breaths.

Never ones to be mourned, both dad and Sally had asked for a celebration in their memory instead of any types of formal services at funeral homes and grave sites, etc. Sally had an 'A-wake' party at the country club before she passed. It was a real shindig. Tonight we are having another celebration at the club (tears now) for Dad.
The theme of it will be...

View attachment 936651

Sally and Ken, together again!

I was listening to one of my son's CD's this morning and the lyrics in one if his songs says, "When I go out, I wanna go in style. No sad faces or slow paces just party like it's another night". Reminded me of this post.
 

Duff

Senior Member
Unbelievable life your dad lived and told amazingly well. As I said in jb’s Cross country thread, 2 of the best I’ve ever read here!!
 

elfiii

Admin
Staff member
Here is dad and Sally with their friends at 'Cowboys' during the Urban Cowboy fad.
On the far right is Glenn Braswell. He was a millionaire with several homes in the Fort Lauderdale area. I was employed for a while as his gopher, groundskeeper, and boat washer. Later he was in prison serving time for mail fraud (man boosting supplements that didn't quite boost your manhood) when Bill Clinton gave him a presidential pardon on his last day in office.
On the left is another millionaire, Barry Paul, who made his money in the oil crisis of the early 70s. When Barry built a waste oil refinery in Fairburn Georgia, he brought DadView attachment 936059 up to the Atlanta area to help him deal with financing and bureaucracy and other red tape.
Thus ends the south Florida chapter.
Third career coming up!

PS-Wes and Janet in the rear moved to California to work on her modeling career. Never heard from them again hardly.

Holy Carp Corbett! I knew Glen and his brother Rod too. Small world!
 

1eyefishing

...just joking, seriously.
Holy Carp Corbett! I knew Glen and his brother Rod too. Small world!
When dad first moved up here to Atlanta, he stayed in one of Glenn's houses over there off of Northside that overlooked I-75...
 

elfiii

Admin
Staff member
When dad first moved up here to Atlanta, he stayed in one of Glenn's houses over there off of Northside that overlooked I-75...

Glenn got back in the magic hair pill and shampoo business over in Doraville shortly after the last time he got run out of it. He was living down in Ft. Lauderdale and pretending he didn't own the business.bounce.gif

That was right before Clinton gave him his pardon.
 

dwhee87

GON Political Forum Scientific Studies Poster
I had the pleasure of meeting your Dad once, and sent many cubic yards of contaminated soil to his facility over the years. Never knew the history. Thanks for sharing such a personal story.
 

1eyefishing

...just joking, seriously.
So, after thinking a while on what was the next thing to say, here is what I want y'all to know.
If you think I am the lucky, economically spoiled brat son of a rich man, you'd be wrong.
Dad was a man for whom it was impossible to ever speak the words 'I love you'. Not to any of his family, his children or even his wife. Ever. Sally used to lament about this fact occasionally. She would be the one to reassure me that he loved us both but he could not bring himself to say it. Not that this killed me, but I reassured myself that I would and did be different when raising my family.
Also, even though he was usually in the catbird seat financially, he never gave me any preferential treatment or any more compensation than the next guy on the job with us. In fact, he was usually harder on me than anybody else around. I remember once making a big mistake pumping a tanker load of diesel fuel into the wrong tank, where it would be hard to separate from other product that was in the tank.(fortunately, we had our methods.) This was not even my job, it was the tanker driver's responsibility to empty his own load, but I had to do it the next day to keep the show rolling. Dad hit the roof and docked me two weeks pay that he had been remiss on paying me already. Less than two weeks later, the tanker driver made the same exact mistake. Dad slapped his knee and laughed about it and said, "Haha, my son did the same exact thing 2 weeks ago!" No repercussions at all for the tanker driver.
When I was in college, I'd spend an entire day every Saturday mowing and taking care of the grounds at his big house in Covington. I was paid $100 for the full day, every week. Then he would generously take me and my wife out to dinner with him and Sally, but make a big deal out of tipping the waitress a hundred bucks! As you can imagine, that did irk me more than a little!
And dad was always somewhat distant with me. He never seem to want to sit down and enjoy a conversation with me until the last couple of years when I stayed with him. It was always ask the question, and get an answer, and be done with it. Until the end, it seemed as though he never really enjoyed my company. At least it changed in the end.
While dad lived on the extremely large scale, all my life, I've been in the cheap seats. But I've always prided myself on having the most fun with what was available to me. I've become a champion at that...

One more thing worth telling is the remarkable thing that Sally did with the will. (Even though dad did lose about 4/5 of his wealth during the stock market crash of 2008, there was still a few zeros on the end of his net worth that the rest of the family will inherit.)
Her oldest son, (Tony, 7 years older than me) had accidentally fathered an illegitimate son before he finally settled down and got married. He never took responsibility, acknowledged, or even spoke of his son. Sally frequently and openly derided him about not having a relationship with his first born son. She was very regretful about not having a relationship with her firstborn grandson. She never knew him. Never met him.
But she put him in the will. He was one of nine benefactors. Of course, to execute the will, we had to find him. Tony was killed 10 years ago in a single car accident (dodging a deer, we believe). Luckily, Sally had a name and the last town her unknown grandson lived in, so we were able to track him down.
He lives in a rural Eastern Tennessee and has worked in the food service industry all his life. A waiter, maitre de, chef, and such, I'm not sure. He and my wife both shared a few tears when she finally got ahold of him to tell him that his grandmother had passed and that she had left a substantial inheritance for him. He said that of course not having a relationship with his father was difficult, but he had always missed having a relationship with a grandmother. He had always wondered about her. My wife reassured him that Sally always wondered about him also, and was very disappointed in her son for not having a relationship that she could join.
My wife reassured him that Sally always wanted that relationship with him, even though she was far from a conventional 'grandmother'. She always told my wife and I that she didn't want to babysit our kids until they were old enough to mix her a cocktail! Ha!
But she did have a heart of gold. Without her, my relationship with my dad would have not been even what it was through the years.
Even though I've had a very tough life (quite a few years in there where I had no parental or familial relationships at all), I realize now that I am blessed.
My share of the inheritance can now be used to make up a little for said difficult life. I plan on fishing and hunting and loving everyday until I can no longer participate in the things I love.
If I have the time left after I can no longer get in and out of a boat or the woods by myself, I might just reintroduced myself to the arts and music. Maybe I'll try to learn a little guitar...
 
Last edited:

Cmp1

BANNED
So, after thinking a while on what was the next thing to say, here is what I want y'all to know.
If you think I am the lucky, economically spoiled brat son of a rich man, you'd be wrong.
Dad was a man for whom it was impossible to ever speak the words 'I love you'. Not to any of his family, his children or even his wife. Ever. Sally used to lament about this fact occasionally. She would be the one to reassure me that he loved us both but he could not bring himself to say it. Not that this killed me, but I reassured myself that I would and did be different when raising my family.
Also, even though he was usually in the catbird seat financially, he never gave me any preferential treatment or any more compensation than the next guy on the job with us. In fact, he was usually harder on me than anybody else around. I remember once making a big mistake pumping a tanker load of diesel fuel into the wrong tank, where it would be hard to separate from other product that was in the tank.(fortunately, we had our methods.) This was not even my job, it was the tanker driver's responsibility to empty his own load, but I had to do it the next day to keep the show rolling. Dad hit the roof and docked me two weeks pay that he had been remiss on paying me already. Less than two weeks later, the tanker driver made the same exact mistake. Dad slapped his knee and laughed about it and said, "Haha, my son did the same exact thing 2 weeks ago!" No repercussions at all for the tanker driver.
When I was in college, I'd spend an entire day every Saturday mowing and taking care of the grounds at his big house in Covington. I was paid $100 for the full day, every week. Then he would generously take me and my wife out to dinner with him and Sally, but make a big deal out of tipping the waitress a hundred bucks! As you can imagine, that did irk me more than a little!
And dad was always somewhat distant with me. He never seem to want to sit down and enjoy a conversation with me until the last couple of years when I stayed with him. It was always ask the question, and get an answer, and be done with it. Until the end, it seemed as though he never really enjoyed my company. At least it changed in the end.
While dad lived on the extremely large scale, all my life, I've been in the cheap seats. But I've always prided myself on having the most fun with what was available to me. I've become a champion at that...

One more thing worth telling is the remarkable thing that Sally did with the will. (Even though dad did lose about 4/5 of his wealth during the stock market crash of 2008, there was still a few zeros on the end of his net worth that the rest of the family will inherit.)
Her oldest son, (Tony, 7 years older than me) had accidentally fathered an illegitimate son before he finally settled down and got married. He never took responsibility, acknowledged, or even spoke of his son. Sally frequently and openly derided him about not having a relationship with his first born son. She was very regretful about not having a relationship with her firstborn grandson. She never knew him. Never met him.
But she put him in the will. He was one of nine benefactors. Of course, to execute the will, we had to find him. Tony was killed 10 years ago in a single car accident (dodging a deer, we believe). Luckily, Sally had a name and the last town her unknown grandson lived in, so we were able to track him down.
He lives in a rural Eastern Tennessee and has worked in the food service industry all his life. A waiter, maitre de, chef, and such, I'm not sure. He and my wife both shared a few tears when she finally got ahold of him to tell him that his grandmother had passed and that she had left a substantial inheritance for him. He said that of course not having a relationship with his father was difficult, but he had always missed having a relationship with a grandmother. He had always wondered about her. My wife reassured him that Sally always wondered about him also, and was very disappointed in her son for not having a relationship that she could join.
My wife reassured him that Sally always wanted that relationship with him, even though she was far from a conventional 'grandmother'. She always told my wife and I that she didn't want to babysit our kids until they were old enough to mix her a cocktail! Ha!
But she did have a heart of gold. Without her, my relationship with my dad would have not been even what it was through the years.
Even though I've had a very tough life (quite a few years in there where I had no parental or familial relationships at all), I realize now that I am blessed.
My share of the inheritance can now be used to make up a little for said difficult life. I plan on fishing and hunting and loving everyday until I can no longer participate in the things I love.
If I have the time left after I can no longer get in and out of a boat or the woods by myself, I might just my tree introduced myself to the arts and music. Maybe I'll try to learn a little guitar...

Nice,,,,reminds me a bit like the relationship between me and my Dad,,,,
 

1eyefishing

...just joking, seriously.
Glenn got back in the magic hair pill and shampoo business over in Doraville shortly after the last time he got run out of it. He was living down in Ft. Lauderdale and pretending he didn't own the business.View attachment 937465

That was right before Clinton gave him his pardon.

So I guess I'm probably wrong about him being in prison at the time of the pardon.
With all the legal trouble that was surrounding him and his propensity to play hide and seek with a half a dozen different houses, I guess he outsmarted me too...
 
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