Parallel Universes
Background: Although I preferred Marvel comics (Spidey, Thor, etc.), I didn’t totally shun DC comics. One of the many differences between the two was DC’s use of “parallel universes”. It was when something big transpired, like Superman getting caught in a super-nova sun explosion. When he’d get back to earth, everything seemed completely the same, but then he’d spot Lois……. married to Jimmy Olson!  Almost everything was the same, but with some huge weird stuff going on.

The super nova: My wife’s family was unlike any I had ever met before. Back in the day, they would have pretty much intellectual debates rather than arguments. I used to marvel at the contrast between them and practically any family, certainly my own. No way could we Sommer children (and parents) could remain so, I don’t know….. intellectual. So it was no surprise when Claude had a slight disagreement/debate with one of his daughters (age about forty). Things never got noisy, although they were in disagreement with each other. Suddenly, she had to rush out of the house, late for something, and I was alone with Claude. I made my “uh oh, I hope I don’t get in trouble for saying this” noise, followed by my honest, though in retrospect perhaps the tiniest bit rude question. Paraphrasing the conversation, I asked Claude, “At what age do one’s children have to be before the parent no longer tells them what to do?”

​Claude responded: “I wouldn’t assume to tell my adult child what to do. However, it is not a parent’s right, but their duty to continue to try to provide guidance to their child, no matter what the age.”

It was one of those bizarre radical moments that I felt everything shift ever so slightly. It was as though I had been blown into a parallel universe where everything looked exactly the same, but something was permanently different. Instantly, I was shown my possible future: rather than just being needed as the father of my children, I could be an important contributor to them as grownups. Always important. Always their father. Years later, I still happily inhabit this wonderful parallel universe, and I will always be grateful to my father-in-law for taking me here.

Dedicated to Claude Nolen who died March 2, 2015.

As I was penning the lobster story, I was amazed that I was simultaneously reminiscing about my vacation in St. Kitts and visiting with my father in the back kitchen of our Holiday House banquet room when I was a teenager. After I finished the lobster tale I realized why this memory was rekindled: it’s a similar theme separated by twenty years. Even today, both examples continue to provide me guidance.

​Part One:  The Busboys
My best friend, Jack, and I were busboys at my Dad’s huge banquet facility during our teenage years. We spent most Saturday nights moving bus trays of dirty dishes from the banquet room to the dishwasher. By midnight we would then haul the incredibly heavy trays stacked tightly with clean dishes to the back kitchen. At 17, Jack told my Dad that his father was needing him at his paint store, so he gave his two week notice. After he left, my Dad declared to me, “You know, when an employee gives me notice, I’d just as soon pay them and have them not bother to come in.  Every person’s work turns to junk after they give notice—everyone except Jack. If it’s possible, I think he worked harder those last two weeks than he did before.  If he called me needing a job and there was nothing available, I’d create one for him."

This teenage lesson stuck with me throughout my lifetime of work.  I would like for all my employers to mourn my departure.  I want to set a precedent that no one could match.  So many years later I think—thanks Dad for the lesson, and thanks Jack for setting the bar so high when we were so young.

Part Two: The Lobster
Actually, truth be told, it was what happened to me on the way back from a lobster.  It was Denise’s and my tenth wedding anniversary celebration, and we had saved up for the last five years to take a vacation.  So, there we were, sharing a large patio area with only one other couple, and drooling about ordering my first (and only) lobster.  We saw a branch with a half dozen coconuts break off and crash to the ground.  Beyond the trees a woman was feeding her goats on the meager grass area leading up to the sea.  It was peaceful and incredibly beautiful.  After our long and delicious meal we began the hour drive around the west side of the island to our hotel.  As I was mentally recounting that evening’s events, I had a strange “vision”.  I found myself viewing my three children.  The eldest, who was currently eight, was all grown up, sitting at the table Denise and I had been sitting with his two younger sisters.  To my amazement, they were all long past being “grown up”; actually, they were old.  Very old.  Justin was in his mid-eighties, still tall but a little stooped over.  He had bottle of Red Stripe beer near his left hand.  I was shocked to see his aged and wrinkled face; though still handsome.  Monique, only a year younger, still looked like my little koala bear—but gray and a bit wrinkled herself and still quite adorable.  Adele was around 80, sitting upright with uncommonly good posture.  Rather elegant I thought, and beautiful.  Both girls had drinks on the table with little umbrellas in them.

The girls were leaning over the table laughing so hard they could barely talk and Adele was begging Justin, “Justin, please.  Stop.  I can’t breathe!”  Justin, looking innocently at his sisters replied, “What?  I was just asking… remember what Daddy said after coaching Monique’s soccer team?”  Both girls howled in unison, “Daddy said, ‘Never coach a sport you don’t know the rules to!’”  Then Monique shared a memory about my squeezing into her Volkswagen “Thing” to test drive it with my knees practically in my face, followed by a story from Adele recalling the last year of city softball she played with me as her coach.    

Then their voices grew fainter, and as they became more distant I realized it was an image I was “seeing” from heaven.  I had been dead for a number of years—that’s why the children were so old.  What a strange “vision” of sorts.  What’s the deal here?  Then the answer came to me:  How do you want to be remembered? Will I be long gone and never be thought of again?  Will I evoke memories or lessons that are passed on to generations who never met me?

In my years of counseling I have encountered an amazing array of people’s experiences and memories.  I have met children and adults who have recounted fathers who never kept their promises, and angry, stressed out mothers who kept the house in turmoil.  I’ve also visited with people who need help in dealing with the sadness of losing a father who was always protective and provided guidance all their lives; and mothers who went out of their way to nurture and unconditionally love their child—even well into their adult years.  Included in people’s recollections are endless stories of loving, kind grandparents who “taught me so much and were always there for me”.  

​If a parent (or grandparent) finds themselves coming up short, the time is overdue to refocus on what it is they need to do push themselves to create their legacy.  What kind of memories do we wish to impart?  How do we want to be remembered?

I wrote this note last year, almost to the day. Like the children he worked with, I was also blessed by our relationship. He was torn up with his first stroke (which also left him with a West Indies/Jamaican accent). Two years later the second stroke left him slowly withering away in a nursing home. I had the inspiration to read to him, and now a year after his passing, I know it was me who gained the most from the experience. I still think of him on a daily basis. The following was written on Feb. 14, 2015.

An extraordinary man just died.  Charles Webb, father of four and miraculous counselor of thousands of children, died after a long and most difficult existence following two strokes. 
 
I met Charles in 1978 when we both began our counseling work at New Horizons Ranch, a residential treatment center for abused, neglected children. We were hired only two weeks apart.  Previously, we had both worked, unknown to each other, at the State School (for incarcerated kids) for a year or two.  Both of us were city boys, me from the San Francisco Bay Area, and Charles from Port Arthur.  Way out in the country, we were introduced to occasional snakes, foot-long centipedes and me, unfortunately, to a brown recluse spider. 
 
In 1980, as I lay dangerously ill from my spider bite, the only co-worker to come see me was Charles.  When he came in my hospital room, due to his size, he had to wear a gown on his left side and another on his right.  Although I was racked with pain, the giant yellow combination accented by a silly looking surgical mask had me doubled over in laughter and love for my friend. 
 
I left the Ranch in 1982 and began counseling different populations and different ages. For twenty-something years, Charles worked only with the most severely abused of children.  The Ranch owner, knowing the power and beauty of Charles’s magnificent voice, asked him to create a children’s choir.  He created one of the most beautiful and amazing choirs in the state.  They toured numerous cities, calling attention to not only the needs of children in residential treatment, but also the joy and wonder of magically performed music. 
 
He finally retired, but was always drawn to the aid of children.  He was hired by the local MHMR, but the stroke of the previous year disabled him too much.  He finished his long and illustrious career with me as a therapist in my office.  I felt then, as I do now, that our final opportunity to work together was our gift from God. Shortly thereafter, he was felled by the second stroke.  He lay in the nursing home, with occasional trips to the hospital for a year and a half.  He was immobilized and his already weakened voice became inaudible.  His caretaker and love, Jane Cadena, was by his side throughout the terrible ordeal.  I’m certain his final months were made so much more bearable by being cared for by Jane’s nursing abilities and her great and loyal love of Charles.
 
Charles once told me that he was at Wal-Mart when a twenty-four year old man shouted out for everyone to hear, “There’s Charles Webb!  He’s the man that raised me!  He’s the man that saved my life!”  Although embarrassed, he was thrilled to the bottom of his heart to have succeeded in saving this young man’s life with his wondrous counseling.  I wonder what the other thousand grown children would say. 
 
It is likely that Charles Webb’s work with kids was some of the most gifted and blessed of all men.  We have lost a great man.  God bless you, my loving friend. I will miss you for the rest of my life.

Man I was tired. I had just seen five kids in a row, including two hyper little animals that took all my energy to (hopefully) do some good work with. It was one of those exhaustions that you can hardly move your jaw to speak. It was finally time to head home (a very short commute, fortunately), and as I pulled in the driveway, there was my eleven year old son waiting for me with a basketball tucked under his arm. I was so tired. I thought: “son, don’t you have any friends? Do I always have to be your entertainment director?” Of course, I would never say such a thing, but I was worn out to the bone. I told him we needed to have supper first, hoping I could find a tiny drop of energy in the meantime. During supper I mentally recounted the five kids I had just seen. It then occurred to me that something was all screwed up with my priorities if I expended all of my time, creativity and energy with everyone else’s kids, and then I stiff my own kids. What’s wrong wit dat picture? I either needed to reduce the energy I put into my counseling kids so I’d have more when I get home, or I needed to create new energy once I got home. We know that during a long workday, if we take a break, we have to restart ourselves to get up to speed again. Going home was no different, except being a good father was way more important than restarting myself back when I was a busboy. So that’s what I started doing: mentally creating energy for my family. Wear me out willya? Perhaps not. Now, many years later, and clearly less stamina, I wish for the same experience with my grandsons. I have a vision: when they are here for a visit, they crawl across the floor, dragging themselves exhaustedly towards their beds, begging to finally get to sleep after an amazing day with us. It doesn’t always happen exactly like that, but I sure would like it to.
So what to do about our kid’s needing us for memories, for inspiration, for an example of how they might want to be someday as a parent? Most families I know use the wonder of electronics as their kid’s entertainment director. TV, video, and phones are the staple of most busy parents way of keeping their kid’s occupied. All are good, but to replace you as their entertainment director? Dude – get a job. The job. Work hard for your employers, but don’t forget your loyalties to your family. It’s two jobs, and really, what else are you going to do with your time? Watch TV? I have a better idea.

In an attempt to properly separate the essays from the blog contributions, I will occasionally announce if I've posted a new essay, hopefully worth reading. This time I believe I have. A little while back, I had a run of teenage girls who's behavior, I believe, were affected by knuckleheaded fathers. And by behavior, I mean really poor behavior. In an attempt to remind Dads of their importance in their childrens' lives, and in this case, their daughters, I wrote Fathers and Daughters. Fear not parents of the opposite sex: boys are on deck.
Go to the top of this page, and click on the essays.