You Remind Me of Your Dad

It is inevitable when you live in a small town that you will do bsuiness with people who did business with your parents. That is a good thing. Still, it did rock me a bit when banker said that I reminde her of my dad. She meant it as a compliment. I took it that way. It did make me think. How am I like my dad? She was mainly talking about my mannerisms.

My dad owned a small retail buisness in Sturgeon Bay, WI. This woman was a teller at the bank. After a couple of mergers and acquisitions, her bank and my bank wound up as part of the same company. We had not seen each other in over 20 years. My dad has been gone for over 25 years. The fact that he left such a lasting impression on her is kind of cool. Every business day my dad would walk the deposit down to the bank about 3 blocks from the store. We joked that he could never make the trek in less than an hour. He stopped and talked to everybody.

My father's people skills were better than mine. Everybody seemed to like him. His attention to detail was better than mine. This was at a time when we did not own a computer. My dad had a ledger book. For you younger folks, a ledger book is similar to a manual spreadsheet. Everyday he did his ledger entries. He used an adding machine with a paper roll on it. Everything had to add up to the penny, or he would spend as long as it takes to find the mistake. Me? I go over my weekly settlements when I get them an am doing good if I am less than a month behind on my data entry.

Dad was less skeptical than I am. He trusted people. He believed in them from the onset. It takes me awhile. Dad was less confrontational than I am. He could be talked into things more easily that I can. The person of most influence was probably the last person to speak with him. Agreement was more his thing than debate.There are alot of times that I wish that I was more like him.

My father did not leave me a dime. At the end of his life he was fighting bankruptcy. Im many ways, I thik that his fiscal demise led to his physical one. He passed away at 66. He was legally blind. He had taken shrapnel in his face as a teen ager and never took a government benfit for it. His trusting ways contributed to his bankruptcy. Maybe that is why I am more skeptical than him. I don't know. He gets smarter as I get older. We are not the same person, but this once it was cool to heat that I reminded someone of a great man.