LynnMarie

Boots

There is a pair of black rubber rain boots on my patio. Not because I wore them once and they were muddy and I left them outside the door so I wouldn’t track mud into the house – no, these boots are a permanent fixture of my patio decor. My husband filled them both with potting soil and planted ivy and petunias in them. But, one boot has grown and flourished; the other is dead as a doornail. Before I get ahead of myself, let me tell you why I even have boots filled with flowers on my patio.

My mom and dad had six of us kids, and somehow we all managed to outlive my parents, even though our life styles much of the time didn’t support such an outcome. So, when my dad died last July, my brother Lenny (who manages to walk the line between intellect and emotion really well) was handling all the funeral arrangements. In making the decision on who the pallbearers would be, he had an idea: “Dad pretty much carried each of us throughout our lives through many rocky times. I think it only appropriate that we six carry him to his final resting place.” Brilliant idea! And because he thinks about the practical, he added, “But how will the girls carry the coffin in high heels?” The answer? Black plastic rain boots!

My father Lud was a character, although I’ve yet to see him portrayed on screen, he was larger than life itself.  He was one of those “go-getters,”’ a non-stop ball of energy and talent. And he was always right, always looking for the deal, and always entertaining. I remember my first communion party, and thinking that it was boring and not very fun, until my father took out his accordion. Within a minute the place was lively and full of life. I watched in awe as a seven-year old and knew then that that’s what I wanted to be when I grew up. I saw that day the power of music to transform people’s spirits, people’s hearts, and I wanted to become like my dad — a spirit changer.

Along with being an entertainer, my dad spent the first fifty years of his life an abuser- abusing his body. He drank a case of beer and a bottle of whiskey, along with smoking four packs of cigarettes, a day. Yes, a day! He had his first heart attack at fifty, and took his initial stab a sobriety two weeks later after he emerged from a coma.  All of that booze, along with failed attempts to live life in a non-altered state also made him a man that you could love and hate in the same second!  He would give you the shirt off his back, and then when you had it on, tell you that you looked like shit in it.  When my husband was just 21, he called and asked my dad’s permission to marry his youngest daughter. “Call me back in two weeks,” was his response.  Needless to say, from that moment on Jim and my dad had a love/hate relationship.

My father spent the last 31 years of his life cheating death and dealing with the residual effects of all that self-inflicted abuse. He also seemed to be part feline in his constitution, because there were many times my brothers and sisters and I were called to his bedside to say our goodbyes, only to discover that he was only on life number six or seven.  One time in particular we all flew to Naples, Florida, where he went to escape the Cleveland winters. It was Easter weekend and he lay once again in a coma without much hope of pulling out of it. I said my goodbyes and had to catch a flight that Sunday morning, Easter morning. As I waited for my plane, I got a call from my husband who had stayed behind. “Lynn, you’re not gonna believe this — but he has risen again!” Not only that, but to make sure he had all his “faculties” the doctor asked him to point out the people in the room. “Why, that’s my beautiful daughter Karen Rose, and you’re Dr. Bogart, and that guy (pointing to my husband), that guy right there is a pain in the ass.” YES! He’s back.

But in July of 2009, he did in fact reach life number nine. As I lay next to him and sang to him in his Slovenian language, the tear that fell from his eye said what he could not say … “goodbye.”

It rained the night before his burial service, but we were prepared. As the coffin was wheeled out from the funeral home, the six of us walked along side it, the boys intermixed between us three girls in order to distribute the weight, and my sisters and I were wearing our boots. In true Hrovat fashion, we added an exclamation point to the already great sentence. Late in the night, with no sleep and tears in her eyes, my sister, Karie, took white shoe polish that she found amongst my father’s things and painted “WE LOVE LUD” on the outside of each boot. As we walked up the soggy hill that July morning to place my father next to my mom, there was no doubt about the amount of love we had for our dad. For a man, who even though he couldn’t tame his own demons, loved us the best he could. For a father who left this world penny-less, because he gave all his earnings to support his children’s dreams, and for a father who, through his faults, taught us to be better fathers, better mothers and better people.

Now, in the mornings when I have my coffee and contemplate how I might make the best use of my day, I stare at the boots. I don’t find it ironic at all that one is flourishing and one is dead. It is to me a reminder that the living must go on living after our loved one moves on.

After watching several batches of flowers die in the right boot, my husband took a candle and placed it in the dirt. And to mark the one-year anniversary of his death, he lit the right boot and we reflected on the man, the legend, and the one-of-a-kind spirit changer.