His actions are what leave a dad's legacy

The 1978 movie Superman begins with some memorable lines by Marlon Brando playing the role of Jor-El, the Kryptonian father of Kal-El, better known as Superman. As he is about to place their baby boy into the cradle to launch him towards Earth, Brando assures his wife and Kal-El’s mother “He will not be alone. He will never be alone.” Later, just before launching him, he explains: “The richness of our lives will be yours. All that I have, all that I’ve learned, everything I feel…all this and more, I bequeath you, my son. You will carry me with you all the days of your life. You will see my life through your eyes, as your life will be seen through mine.”

That’s fatherhood — a true father.

We have all seen the less than ideal — often way less. Yet, for today let’s seek the ideal.

Shortly before he died a few years ago, my brother, who was born in 1928, recounted a story of what he observed on the morning of September 8, 1934, off the shore of New Jersey. The cruise ship, the Morro Castle, steaming north from Havana towards New York had caught fire and people were jumping ship to save their lives. My brother observed our father change into his swimsuit and jump into the water and swim towards the ship, about a mile offshore. He swam to the ship at least twice, each time returning with either a dead body or a wounded survivor, laying the bodies on the beach.

I had never before heard that story from my father or anyone else. Yet in the Superman sense, I have carried “the richness of [my parents’]  lives…all the days of [my life.]" Even when I, shortly after hearing that Morro Castle story, lost a son, I hoped then and I hope now that somehow “[his] life will be seen through mine.”

Thus, tragedy can bring out the true father. I believe it was true about my father that day long ago. He was a great ocean swimmer, and I can almost see him bringing those people ashore. Rarely did he talk big. In this instance, and in so many other ways, he let his actions over a lifetime speak for him.

Let’s flash forwards to another terrible day, this time seared into our collective and recent memories. On May 24 in Uvalde, Texas a gunman murdered 19 young school children. The story of the father who grabbed a shotgun and intervened to rescue his daughter and her classmates is hopefully not the only story of heroism that will eventually come out from that tragic day, with its current stories of inadequate courage.

Actor Matthew McConaughey struck the right tone. His comments, as noted by Kate Sullivan on CNN on June 8, were helpful: "Enough with the counterpunching. Enough of the invalidation of the other side. Let’s come to the common table that represents the American people."

Good words from a man married in 2012, and the father of three children.

I am no fan of our current President, who seems unable to serve effectively, yet alone reach across the aisle, as he promised he would. However, somewhat alike in the personal history of President Jimmy Carter, there are some personal traits in Joe Biden that might be cause for optimism.

In an essentially flattering article in “The Conversation” on June 15, 2021, the writer noted that "The measure of a man is not how often he is knocked down,’ Joe Biden Sr. told his son, ‘but how quickly he gets up’…His father’s support boosted young Joe’s political career, and offered comfort when Joe Jr.’s wife and daughter were killed in a car crash…Biden remembered his late father’s belief that ‘there is no higher calling for a woman or a man than to be a good mother or a good father.'"

I am surely not alone in America in hoping that some of those personal traits, character traits that come from seeing a parent get knocked down and get back up; from seeing a father be there for him when he faces the tragedy of losing a wife and daughter; and from personally working through the death of a son — become more evident in President Joe Biden’s public life. If so, perhaps he too can be counted in a public sense as a true father.

Biden and McConaughey may have uttered some helpful words, but I nominate once again for a true father of his children, and of his country, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. His inaugural address words in 2019 bring Brando’s words on Krypton to life, in the here and now: “I really do not want my picture in your offices…Hang your kid’s photos instead, and look at them each time you make a decision.”

Happy Father’s Day!

Contact Larry Little at larrylittle46@gmail.com. 

This article originally appeared on Kitsap Sun: Larry Little: His actions are what leave a dad's legacy