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60 isn’t old, and other things I learned from dad

This past month my dad turned 60. I used to think 60 was old, but I’ve never thought of my dad as being old. I guess now I need to rethink that, especially considering he’s in better shape than I am. Maybe 38 is old.

The other day I was thinking back to when I was a kid, a home-schooled 10-year-old who got his studies done in a couple of hours. When the teacher/student dynamic is one-on-one, the schoolwork is a lot more efficient. I spent the rest of the day reading; wandering the woods with a hatchet, hacking every branch within reach; playing with Legos®; and sorting through baseball cards.

This was pre-Internet, and I was introverted as it was. I loved sorting through my cards and listening to Ernie Harwell call Tigers games, well after I was supposed to be sleeping.

Dad worked every day cutting sheet metal for Steelcase. Each day he'd come home, and more times than not, there was a gift for me: a pack of Topps (and sometimes Donruss) ball cards, complete with the best, most terrible gum ever invented. It was a little thing that meant the world to me.

I had the stats for every player memorized. I'd sort them by team, by name, by position. I'd dump them out and do it again, then add the new ones to it and start over. There's not a mint card left in the bunch!

But friends would ask me about pretty much any player, and I’d be able to rattle off their batting average, home run totals by year, and if they’d won a Gold Glove or a Silver Slugger award.

Funny, I always wondered why dad had holes in the front bottom of every shirt he had. He always came home with that smell you get from only sweat and metal and worn shirts. Now all of my shirts are the same, from brushing up against metal tables and pushing steel around. And the smell is still familiar, although with a hint of argon added.

Crazy that he just turned 60. He (along with mom, of course) is responsible for any good that's in me, and all of the bad is in spite of him. He’s still the only person I know that just demands respect without ever demanding respect. I wouldn’t be half of who I am without him. Love you, Dad!

All images courtesy of Brown Dog Welding.

About the Author
Brown Dog Welding

Josh Welton

Owner, Brown Dog Welding

(586) 258-8255