Long Island readers share stories about their dads on Father's Day.

Opinion

I was a student at Brooklyn College during the turmoil of the Vietnam War. Demonstrations became an everyday occurrence after the tragic shooting deaths of four students by the Ohio National Guard at Kent State University in 1970, the year of my graduation. 
Between classes, we lined up with antiwar signs and posters on the campus quadrangle. Students made speeches. We listened and applauded. Everyone turned a blind eye to those who objected. Killing college students was our last straw.
My dad worked in Manhattan and each morning would stop at the 42nd Street library to find out the newest number of young American soldiers killed in Vietnam.
We lived in Midwood, not far from the campus. After work, he would come to the college in the afternoon with a poster and show his support for our demonstrations. He would write the new number of fallen heroes on his sign.
I was so proud of him. There were no other parents at the college demonstrating against the war, only my dad, Fred Lefkof. 
He was easily recognized. He wore his suit, tie and fedora and stood proudly on the steps of Boylan Hall. He demonstrated with intense patriotism, showing his dissatisfaction for an unjustified war. He felt the Viet Cong were no threat to the security of the United States. There was no need draft our finest young men and send them to war. A Marine veteran of World War II, he understood what it meant to be in combat. He had lived through the horrors of war and did not want young people to experience them.
He made politics and current events a staple at the dinner table each night. Walter Cronkite and dessert went hand in hand. Walter and Dad were my two most trusted men in America.
Dad always made a point of reading The New York Times and sharing the most important articles of the day with me. In my teen years, he insisted that I "go through" the paper each day if I really wanted to be smart. We started with international top stories and covered the whole paper, including the obituaries. He made a news junkie out of me at an early age.
I lost my dad in 1996 when he was 83. I have his picture framed in the den next to the TV at my home in North Woodmere. I'll give it a subtle glance when I see a news story on TV about war. Yes, Dad, I know exactly what you'd say, because conflict brought you back to your own days at war.
Reader Phyllis Weinberger lives in North Woodmere.

Commentary

OPWEINBERGER

Dad, a veteran, marched with us against the Vietnam War

Essay: My dad protested with us

RE Weinberger cropped

In the treasure chest of gems I inherited from my father when I was born, I can count blue eyes, freckles, long toes and a love of all things Irish. But there's one dark characteristic John G. Melia bequeathed to me that has cast a dark shadow over every summer of my life: a deadly fear of bugs. 
When did I first realize this? It may have been the first time I saw him frantically brushing ants off his feet in our backyard in a dance against Mother Nature. Or it could have been the day I saw him spraying everything in sight with a mist that left a hazy stench around our house for hours.
His phobia almost killed my family. I was about 10 years old and looking forward to our yearly summer vacation in the mountains. My father and mother packed their five young daughters into their '55 Chevy. After a few hours of singing, arguing and snacking in the car, just when everyone was settling down, my father let out a blood-curdling scream and the car suddenly lurched to the right, pulling off the road near a steep cliff. With a sense of panic, my father shut off the engine, jumped out of the car and started swatting his pants. A few minutes later, as the six of us watched with terror, we spotted the problem. A furry bumblebee, big as a bird, flew out of the ankle of his pant leg -- and my father sighed with relief. 
You could say that my sisters and I have been scarred for life by this fear. On a hot summer day, when we sit by the pool and a fly lands on one of us, the scene is dramatic. The victim jumps up quickly, flails her arms and runs in circles. Considering ourselves warned, the rest of us follow suit in what looks like a mad parade, until the coast is clear and the danger passes. The bonding grows deeper with each summer. 
You may be surprised to know there is an advantage to this fear that we share. After years of battle, we are ever prepared, whether the enemy be grasshoppers, cicadas, yellow jackets, beetles or the dreaded earwigs.
For instance, my sister Mary knows the exact date -- Aug. 10 -- when the greenhead flies will arrive in her pool. Eileen knows that on June 1, she can find the beginnings of a wasp nest in her barbecue -- and destroy it. I know that on March 15, I'd better call the exterminator or my kitchen cabinets will become a diner for a colony of ants.
My son-in-law Nat has watched these antics for years with the objectivity of one who is part of the family but lacks our DNA. When I visited him and my daughter a few years ago, they gave me a tour of their beautiful vegetable garden. My granddaughter Olivia, then 3, held my hand as we walked. Sure enough, a bee flew by and I started waving both arms. Olivia looked at me and said, "It's OK, Nana. The bees are our friends." I looked at Nat with awe as he explained he was determined to break this family tradition.
My dad would be so proud of him. 
Reader Kathy Levine lives in Long Beach.

OPLEV21

Direct from Dad -- our fear of bugs

Essay: Dad's phobia almost killed my family

opLEVINE

One of my first memories of my father is of him guarding my back as I sat on a narrow, pale wood credenza and looked out the large glass window at cars passing by his store on Jericho Turnpike in Syosset. I was 4 or 5 years old. 
My dad, Steven Kaplan, and his family owned Post ... Co., a women's clothing store. Visiting him at work was always a highlight for my two siblings and me. 
As well-dressed women searched the racks for wool coats, silk blouses and matching pantsuits, I would sit on my wooden perch, high on the adrenaline of youthful curiosity. In his endearingly protective manner, my dad tightened his arms around me each time I shifted my body.
I would watch the movie theater entrance across the street, where people held hands and laughed mysteriously. With my father's strong hold on my back, I felt bold enough to take in the commotion of the outside world.
Other vivid memories of him continually flit through my mind as I go about my life: him lying on his side on the floor building block towers with my sister and me; playing 20 questions when I refused to go to sleep at night (he was always a wapiti, which years later I learned is an elk); eating an entire bowl of blueberries as he watched his University of North Carolina Tarheels on TV; sputtering out words through laughter as he told me from across the tennis court that he just played the entire set left-handed; walking me down the aisle on my wedding day at Cold Spring Country Club; growing teary-eyed as we sat at Millie's Place in Manhasset after I announced my pregnancy with my first child and his first grandchild; giggling as my son poked Grandpa's face.
Time after time, my dad sacrificed his own needs and desires for the well-being of others. One day, after years of uneventful visits to the same barber, he walked into our kitchen with a small bare patch in his otherwise full head of freshly trimmed hair. 
My brother asked, "Why would you ever go to an 80-year-old man who can't cut hair anymore?" 
"I've been going to him for 30 years," my dad replied. "I'm not going to abandon him now."
On the day before he died in the summer of 1997, he played in a charity golf tournament in honor of his friend's grandson, who has Down syndrome. Though my dad had too much to drink that evening, and most likely fell asleep at the wheel, he spent his last hours on Earth sending good energy into the world. 
It's been almost 18 years since my father's fatal car accident. He was only 54. Each and every day since that tragic night I have been filled with inspiration from and love for a man who continues to be a hero to me.
My relationship with my father has evolved since his death. Though each family milestone that he misses brings a painful reminder of his absence, the years of living with him inside of my head have brought me closer to him in a way that is indescribable.
His words flow through my mind at random times, leaving me breathless. Often, especially as I am about to drift off to sleep and the air is still and quiet, I hear his voice and its humorous ring as if he spoke moments ago.
"Anyone who matches perfectly looks like an idiot," he'd say. Or, "What are you gonna do about it?" Or, "You gotta laugh." 
Every year on my wedding anniversary, which is the last time I saw him conscious, I think of our last hug goodbye. He and my mother had been babysitting for my 10-month-old son while my husband and I enjoyed dinner at Louie's in Port Washington. As my dad left our Great Neck apartment, he grabbed me in a big bear hug and kissed my cheek. I could not have known when he said, "I love you," that those would be the last words I would hear him speak. Five days later he was gone. The words have echoed through the days of my life ever since.
Reader Karin Greenberg lives in Dix Hills.

OPGREENBERG

My dad is inside my head

Essay: My dad is still inside my head

Greenberg Cropped

I hated it. It didn't even match. His hair was black and it was red.
My father, Nicholas Rizzo, started growing his mustache during World War II when he was 17 and joined the Coast Guard. That's also when he started losing his hair. The story he told me was that he leaned over the ship's railing and his hair fell into the ocean. That seemed feasible to me at the age of 4. All I knew was that he was bald (except for a swath of black at the back and side) and had a mustache, and that was the only way I'd ever known him. 
It scratched me when he kissed me. I grew up in the East New York section of Brooklyn. Before going to work as a supermarket manager each morning, my father would wake me with a kiss that would irritate my cheek. That, and the smell of English Leather cologne, which was pleasant to most but nauseated me. Yuck.
When we had our own children you could always tell, by the redness of their cheeks, when Pop had kissed them. By now it was white, along with the salt-and-pepper hair.
He turned 90 in July 2013. The next several months were tough ones. By the next March, he was so fragile he needed nursing home care after a difficult hospital stay on Long Island. We were lucky he was still alive. He had been in the nursing home for rehab several times before. They knew him. It was familiar for him.
He was admitted to the nursing home on a Tuesday in March. On Friday, I entered his room to see him sitting in a wheelchair, dressed, neat and clean. But with no mustache. 
I kissed him hello and walked out of the room. I was shaking. A nurse asked if everything was all right.
"They shaved his mustache," I said.
"Oh, you didn't want it shaved?" 
She told me I should have told the staff to make a note that the mustache stays.
My father was lethargic, hardly spoke. I couldn't tell if he knew what had happened.
I called my husband. Trying to make me feel better, he said, "It will grow back." 
I called my brother. After he said a few choice words, he said, "It will grow back."
We all said, "Let's just pray he doesn't know."
It was the supreme indignity in a series of indignities that he had to suffer as he grew weaker.
He didn't have the chance for it to grow back. We had lost my mother in March 1990. By Sunday morning, she called him to be with her. I only hope she recognized him without the mustache.
I know we were lucky to have him for so long. I manage to hold it together because my rational mind tells me we didn't want him to suffer anymore. Circle of life and all that. It's been more than a year. Still, I'm brought to tears every time I think of my father's mustache.
Reader Matilda Russo lives in Bellport.

OPRUSSO

The shock of my father's mustache gone

Essay: 'Let's just pray he doesn't know'

Russo Reader Essay Cropped

Dear Dad, 
Inside the chapel, I stepped toward your coffin to gaze at you lying there, still and silent. I leaned over to kiss your forehead, now cold. It was February 1997, and you, age 70, were dead. 
In the car on the drive over, I had expected to stay calm. But at the sight of the funeral home, I gasped in disbelief and sorrow. 
Later, in the synagogue, I approached the podium to deliver the eulogy, only to have my knees buckle. 
I told how you always acted so gently toward me, never expressing anger or raising your voice, and how you only once spanked me, but reluctantly, without force. 
Tears streamed down my face. Sobs caught in my throat. I was a mess. 
As we headed to the cemetery, I remembered how you, in reality, had failed me as a father. 
You were hardly ever around. You left the house for work before anyone else woke up and usually stayed out until after we got to bed. You were always on the go, no sooner here than gone again, less here than gone. 
Even on weekends, you came home mainly to eat and sleep. You remained remote from us, all but incommunicado. Often, you went down to the recliner in our den to nap. 
I knew why. You sought asylum from the pressures of being a husband and father and brother and son. Sleep turned out to be the only neutral country that would take you in, the only territory you felt you could call all your own. 
Yes, you brought me to work with you and took me fishing and once played catch with me on our front lawn. But otherwise you exempted yourself from asking about my friends and offering to help with my homework or otherwise participating in my life. I hardly knew you, nor you me. I often felt like an afterthought. 
You lived among us almost as a stranger, your presence defined largely by your absence. 
Back in the 1950s and 1960s, that's how most of our fathers acted -- all business. It was how society expected breadwinning fathers to act. 
We reached the cemetery and chanted Kaddish, a Hebrew prayer sad enough, I swear, to induce mourning even if no one has died. And then we laid you in the freshly dug winter soil. 
It seemed too late for either of us to do anything about anything. The opportunity to reconcile appeared gone for good. We'd both blown it big-time. 
Except that belief turned out to be mistaken. 
In the 18 years since you died, I've kept searching for you. I've asked family and friends about you, about why you lived as you lived. And I've learned a lot I never suspected. 
Your sisters both told me how hard you tried to please your own father, but never successfully. A friend told me how you once stepped in to stop a bully in your neighborhood from picking on other kids. A former colleague told me how you served as an advocate for the deaf community for decades without ever expecting a dime in return. 
I came to feel closer to you in death than I ever had in life. Sometimes nothing brings people to life more than dying. 
Now I understand this: You failed me, but I -- if to a lesser extent -- failed you, too. 
I never acknowledged the hardships you faced being born deaf. I never paid much attention to anything you tried to teach me about the value of education, of hard work, of making money. I could hear perfectly, but tuned you out. 
I must have disappointed you as much as you had me. I performed poorly in school. I took a while to get going in a career. I could have handled money better. I acted as if I needed no one, least of all my father, to tell me how to do anything. 
Our fathers often fail us, just as I no doubt often fail my own two children. Wanting to get fatherhood exactly right renders our failures inevitable. But all of us, or at least some of us, could be better sons and daughters, too. 
I'm haunted by how much we left undone. But you and I will never truly be done. I'll always see your face and hear your voice in my dreams. 
Grudges nursed too long turn toxic. So of course I've long since forgiven you. But only recently have I begun to forgive myself, too. 
Your loving son, 
Bob 
Bob Brody, an executive and essayist in Forest Hills, is at work on a memoir about his deaf parents.

OPBRO21

How I failed my father

Opinion: How I failed my father

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