I remember my dad through stories.

The Paper Route thief

It was early Friday evening late enough in the fall of 1961 to be dark out, when the phone rang. Mrs. Tate – I don’t remember her first name because I probably did not know it as in those days kids NEVER called adults by their first name – who lived across the street and two houses down, had called and spoken to either my mom or my dad. She was a teacher at McKinley School just up the street where years earlier I had attended kindergarten. Her kids were older and so I only knew her as a teacher and one of 44 customers on my paper route.

As a paper boy – if there were paper girls, I did not know any nor did I ever see any on all the Saturday mornings when the paper boys from throughout the city gathered to pay their bills in the basement of the Davenport Times and Democrat office building in downtown Davenport, Iowa – every Thursday evening I went around to each of my customers collecting their weekly fee. I had collected from Mrs. Tate the night before and she was calling to tell my parents that another neighborhood kid, Johnny, had tried to collect from her and another of my customers. I gathered from my dad that Mrs. Tate knew Johnny and his brother from school and by neighborhood reputation.

Johnny lived on Belle Avenue, only about three blocks away, but to this 12 year old boy Belle Avenue was another world. I had wandered over to Belle a couple of times but never down the part of the street where Johnny lived. The houses were smaller and the kids tougher, with dirt under their fingernails. My dad told me what Mrs. Tate had said and that we were going to walk over to Johnny’s house to talk with him. I don’t remember what we talked about on the way over but I do remember what my dad said on the way back.

Johnny’s house was small, with a dark and small entry way where I waited while my dad went into the kitchen to talk with Johnny and Johnny’s dad. I remember my dad coming back to the front part of the house alone and we started back home.

We walked in silence up Belle Avenue to East Street and then down East Street to Jersey Ridge Road and then started back up East Street to our home. As we started up the street, my dad said: ‘Johnny is the way he is because of the way his father is.’ He might have said more but it is those words I remember.

In “A thief, a rat and two silences,” I wrote about one of my own episodes of stealing and how my mom and dad dealt with this. This episode had occurred a few months before the Johnny incident. I believe my dad took me to Johnny’s house for the same reason he took me to the police station. The police station showed me where the Johnny’s of the world end up and Johnny’s house and dad where they come from.

Looking back from my current vantage point, I could say that my dad’s messages were simplistic. Perhaps, but they were perfect for that 12 year old kid. In a nutshell, character is not formed in a vacuum. Come to think of it, not a bad reminder for the 70 year old that kid grew up to be.

Dad’s (and mom’s) do matter.