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 June 2007 Back to Table of Contents Back to Archives Main Page Section: Life & Leisure Like Father, Like Son By Theodore Rickard
My paperback dictionary defines “vicarious” as, among other things, “suffering in place of.” I’d quibble with “suffering,” for I have to confess a certain element of personal satisfaction in the entire experience. It starts with the first grandson. My son’s son was born a fickle gourmet with capricious nursing preferences and the lung capacity of a hog caller. No sooner, it seems, had the infant found a satisfactory feeding schedule — every hour on the half hour during all the hours of darkness — than teething began. Teething cost three hollow-eyed weeks before the baby’s grandmother was able to introduce two drops of bourbon into the strained peaches so the new parents could get some sleep and begin again to exercise coherent speech. This was, indeed, a vicarious experience — but something told me not to reminisce about it — at least until my son’s eyes weren’t quite so bloodshot. As the infant grew to toddler size (and my son aged noticeably) I did experience some of the dictionary’s rather threatening “suffering in place of.” But along with it came a somewhat guilt-laden feeling of retributive justice, inadequately disguised as heavenly even-handedness. “What goes around, comes around,” I said to myself, although I had to repeat it several times. There followed the nursery school incident of alphabet blocks — not helped by the child’s grandfather remarking, “Wow, did you see the way that pitch broke to the inside!” A year or so later, the lad rode his little brother’s perambulator down the Hill Street sidewalk after a rainy Saturday afternoon watching televised NASCAR races with “gramps.” Little League brought us the line-drive-broken nose — which let the opposing team score two runs on what should have been a double play — and then there came the agony of acne when the girls in the class were already insisting on dancing. I could especially “suffer in place of” when it came to driving lessons and the first extra set of car keys. There was something downright unreal about the primly methodical procedures of “Driver’s Ed” versus what his father and I both knew were the instincts of the now-hormonal youngster of the NASCAR perambulator. The check-list of seat belts, rearview mirror, etc. seemed pretty pale compared to the lure of imaginary crash helmet, fireproof jump suit, and burning rubber. This had certainly been true a generation ago, when the transmission of the family station wagon proved woefully inadequate to his father’s challenge. I couldn’t resist the reminiscence, I’m afraid, but I did leave out the additional information that the family ate hamburger for a month to amortize the costs from Easy Eddie’s Auto Shop. I showed better restraint in the inevitable Beer-in-Riverside-Park police incident. When it involved the first grandson, somehow my son became an instantly-ordained temperance preacher and had totally forgotten why Riverside Park was such familiar territory to him. I felt rather proud of myself in not reminding him until he began blaming the grandmother’s two drops of bourbon in the strained peaches. Then I reminded him. Two years later I drove my grandson home since his driver’s license was now in the hands of the desk sergeant at the stationhouse. Somehow it seemed a good idea that the youngster ride with me while his father drove the family sedan. This gave me a chance to recall the perambulator ride and add the advice that a real driver would have swung wide in the straightway and then accelerated into the turn going down Hill Street. That’s what his father would have done if the station wagon’s transmission hadn’t conked out on him. It is said that those who ignore history will have to repeat it. I think they mean vicariously — but not always with the “suffering” part. back to top back to table of contents Current Issue | About Forever Young | Where to Find | Advertise | Our Advertisers | Community Calendar | Contest | Clubs | Contact Us | Archives | Home |
