Squid and Male Passivity

Elle as a Young Girl

Mildred married Dutch when Elle was about eight years old and Elle was excited about the prospect of having a father. Now Elle says her step father whom she always introduced as her father was the man who was just there. He was the sort of fellow who turned over his paycheck to Mildred and she paid the bills and made the decisions about pretty much everything. I recall listening when they had to make like “Where do you want to go?” or “What do you want to do?” They’d go back and forth asking each other. It would go the same way each time –a verbal game of tennis until Gran finally made a decision and Pop would follow her leading.

I think Gran would have liked Pop to make more of the decisions or at least offer some assistance but besides working at the steel mill and fishing he left most of life to his wife. He was a passive, quiet, decidedly dependent man. If my grandmother would have been happier with her husband taking more leadership and participating more actively in the day to day decisions and affairs, she did not know how to express such things. Life was more accepted as it came and people usually did what they needed to do with the cards they were dealt.

Pop sometimes went on day fishing trips that meant going on a large boat with other men and returning home with fish he would then clean and cook. Often Pop would fish from piers and he’d take me with him. He quietly taught me how to find things in his tackle box and bait the hook with bloody squid.  I didn’t mind and enjoyed catching a fish that Pop would later clean and fry for us to eat. There is nothing like eating the fish you caught earlier the same day.

Elle said that Pop was there really only in physical presence as she grew. She does not remember him being involved in her life or taking an interest in her world. She recalls one time she went out with a guy she was dating and a group of friends. Elle came home past her curfew time and Pop questions, criticized and ended up slapping her in the face. Elle stood up to him and told him never to touch her again…he didn’t.

It is difficult for me to imagine Pop slapping anyone and it had to be a moment completely out of character for him. He may have been a wimp but he was harmless and my memories of him are mostly him “being there” sitting in his recliner chair or driving…if my grandmother had her license she rarely drove. I recall only one time in my entire childhood that she got behind the wheel when I was on a summer road trip with the two of them. I yearned for the moment when she relinquished the wheel back to Pop and I could breathe easily again. Something about her driving was like her temperament- unpredictable and volatile.

Gran had her explosive moments but never towards me. Whenever Gran had to tell me something she spoke kindly because she adored me. She sometimes told me not to tell Pop about whatever toy or jewelry or game she had bought for me. Gran loved buying things for me and I think it became one her most pleasurable endeavors.

I think Pop was the primary recipient of her frustration venting. Apparently my mother also had received her share and their relationship was on-off in Elle’s early adulthood. In later years Elle adored her mother, would do anything for her and tried all she knew how to keep her alive and well. At Gran’s funeral when I was sixteen my mom threw herself at the casket and wailed uncontrollably-“Mom, Mom!!”