Andys post with the cougar got me thinking.
Some of my fondest memories involve wrenching on something with my father.
Either What led up to it, the actual wrenching, or the aftermath.
My most cherished possessions are my memories, My favorite memories will more than likely have my father somewhere in them.
A little about my father... as I have been thinking a bit about him lately.
My fathers Name was Doug Jones. Actual name was James Douglas Jones. Yep... I am a junior.
The only thing I ever called him was Dad... or Daddy when I was a pup.
He was born in Macon ga in august of 1948 to my Grandparents. Louis V Jones and Esther Marie Jones-Cheshire.
He was the first of their children to survive childbirth. He was the 5th child born.
Shortly before my grandmother became pregnant with him they adopted a young native american child.
After my father my grandmother gave birth to 3 other children and they adopted 3 more for a total of 8 kids in the brood.
They were farmers and my dad grew up doing hard work on the farm.
My father dropped out of high school his senior year to enlist in the Marine Corps.
Raised by a WW II navy vet he had a strong sense of country and friendship... a large part of his enlistment was to avenge friends that went over and didnt return.
While in the Marines my father was trained as infantry, radio operator, EOD tech.
He also was recruited for USMC Force Recon.
After his tour in vietnam he came back stateside and married my mother. This is where I come in.
My father came back with serious personal issues over what he had done in his time overseas.
When I was older I finally got him to talk about it instead of keeping it bottled up.
I have done my share of reading and talking to vets and the things he was a part of rank very high on the list of things I would want to be able to forget.
As a family we drifted from state to state... job to job... for many years.
Looking back I have no idea how we survived, but at the time I didn't have a clue that we were poor.
My sister came along in 1979, and my life took a turn.
She was the 2nd girl born into the family in well over 50 years and everyone deamed her to be a special thing.
She got pretty much all of my families attention from the time I was 8 till I turned 14-15.
She also learned that she could do pretty much anything and blame it on me and no questions would be asked of her.
Therefore at the time I had a deep hatred of her, I have forced myself to get past it... but I am sure aftereffects linger on to this day.
As I got older and less like a child/more like a man... the relationship between my father and I changed.
Time spent together increased, conversations got longer... more indepth.
This man, who I was pretty sure cared nothing for me... and that I was on the verge of hating, and I managed to forge a friendship.
As the years past it got deeper and stronger. It got to the point that we were pretty much inseparable.
We would sit and talk for hours. Go out and wrench on cars... not because there was anything wrong with them... but because they were there and we both loved to have our hands on them.
We hung out, talked, took road trips together... worked together on telecom crews when we discovered the business.
For a few years I felt like I didnt have a father... however from the times I was 14 till he passed away when I was 31 I had so much more than a father.
I have had people I thought were the best of friends that were not a fraction as close as he and I were.
When he passed away from cancer, brought about from dioxin exposure in vietnam, I lost not only my father but the best friend a person could have.

He used to laugh at my love for the pinto.
I know he did this just to mess with me because I learned to drive in his 327 powered Vega... and remember road trips in his blue 76 pinto wagon.
My love for cars... and these cars specifically came from his influence.

This is in general a pointless ramble... as an emptying of the mind should be.

Curtis, I saw you on here browsing and got to thinking about your recent loss.
How it is the opposite of mine but more than likely very similar in some aspects.
I have no idea if you will read this but as a person who has felt at least some of what you are going thru... and will go thru for years to come... My heart goes out to your family.
My father has been gone just over 5 years and many times I still wipe tears when thinking of him.
Tears of sadness that he is gone, tears of relief that he is no longer suffering, tears of joy from my memories.

I am told the pain goes away. I know it dulls, but I hope it never actually leaves... that would mean the dulling of the pictures and movies in my mind... and I will deal with the pain daily to keep those.

My boys are getting older now.
They will be turning 12 and 14 this year.
I am doing my best to get them both up here in Mass with me for the summer.
I will have them outside and under the hood of the cars with me.
I dont have the time with them I would like... I intend to make the most of the time I Do have with them.

One of the few things I would ask of this life...
Is that in the years to come my boys tell their children about hanging out with their father... learning things here and there... but mostly just enjoying each others company.

I dont think it is too much to hope for.


Jim

Very Nice.  You are very lucky man to have had that time. 

Only in the last few years of my fathers life did we both learn to let it all go and became friends.  The person I can remember who probably gave me my love for cars was my Grandpa McMahan on my mothers side.  We used to gofor rides in his Pontiac coupe with a big V8.  I miss him to this day.

Stay true to your goals to spend more time with your kids.  Life cut me out of a lot of years with my kids but luckly we have egained our relationships.

jim

Wrenching with dad..I have been wrenching with my dad before I was even out of the womb. While my mom was pregnant with me my dad locked the shop doors (no one in, no one out) while he built a kick ass 340 duster for my uncle.(people to this day still talk about that car) When my brothers and I where old enough to push a broom we would sweep the shop floor(we had to earn our keep) then we would graduate to tool handler then to jack man..eventually we would get to work on the cars ourselves. I remember things like when I was in the 1st grade I would get off the school bus, drop my books in the driveway and climb into a front engined dragster and play for hours. I remember mechanical fuel injection as a center peice on the dinning room table. I was very fortunate to have learned from someone who had alot of knowledge and was very good at what he did with cars(he has the national and world records to prove it) We always had our hands into something with cars and still do to this day. Thanks Pop for all the wrenching memories and I love you. curtis jr

Thank you Jim, reflection can be a wonderful thing. Here are a couple of pics that are some wonderful memories with my boys.