My father liked sharp. He was a Gillette kind of man. He liked to look sharp, feel sharp and be sharp. I never saw him unshaven except very early in the morning before he’d had a chance to lather up. Beards? He was a child of the hard parts of the Depression and beards were for bums.
My father favored the flat-top for himself and his sons. Butch Wax was a staple in our house and four males could go through a jar a week. He grudgingly accepted my 3-inch “Ivy League” cut once I went off to the university, but was never reconciled to the longer and longer hair that came later.
My father was a sharp-dressed man. He liked the snap of a freshly laundered, starched and ironed white shirt. His suits were always cleaned and pressed and his shoes shined to a military gloss. I still have many of his gold and silver tie-tacks and cuff-links and although I seldom wear them, I do wear them. They make me feel sharp.
My father was a car salesman and a good one. He was a sharp salesman; one that was always looking for what the customer actually wanted as well as what the customer could really afford. For every minute selling, he spent five qualifying. He didn’t boast about being the top salesman at the lot, although he usually was. He did boast that he had the fewest repos of all the salesmen, and the most repeat customers. He liked to sell people cars that he knew they could afford. His most repeated instruction to me was, “Never try to profit off of another’s misfortune.”
My father hated smooth. He liked plain talk and despised euphemism and manipulation, especially among salesmen. He’d fire car salesmen working under him if he caught them lying or even shading the truth to make a sale. He looked at every deal brought to him for approval that the buyer didn’t have the credit for as a failed sale and wouldn’t approve them. “A man that will lie to a customer will lie to you,” he’d say. “Bad for the buyer and worse for the business,” he’d say. “If you let a man buy what he can’t afford on credit, you’re going to be taking the car back and making an enemy. We’re here to get cars off the lot, not see them come back after repossession. A man who can’t make his car payments is a man who can’t maintain his car. A salesman who’s so smooth he’s selling people cars bigger than they can afford is a salesman who’s taking a kickback from the repoman.”
My father was a man for whom honor was essential. Did my father sell as many cars as he could have? Probably not, but he raised three boys well and without want. My mother worked hard, day in and day out, as my mother and did, in the final analysis, a pretty good job of it. My father saved carefully and retired all debt as quickly as possible. When he died, still a relatively young man, after years of expensive medical treatments, my mother was still set up comfortably for life.
My father despised debt and avoided credit. Educated by himself, he’d seen the worst of the depression and, during one hard winter in Pittsburgh in the 30s, had to hang out by the railroad tracks to pick up lumps of coal fallen from the trains in order to heat his home.
My father was a life-long Democrat, and despised Richard Nixon for his five-o’clock shadow and his smooth palaver. He felt the same way about Kennedy. “He looks sharp but when you listen to him he’s just too smooth a talker.”
What would my father think about a President who was a both a sharp-dressed man and was smoothly talking the country into buying trillions of dollars in deficits?
“A salesman who’s so smooth he’s selling people cars bigger than they can afford is a salesman who’s taking a kickback from the repoman.”
Posted by Vanderleun at March 27, 2009 12:41 PM | TrackBack
I like to think men like your father and mine are still out there. Dad was in sales, too.
Like you, I hope my father would have seen through the slick swagger and glib manner of
B.O.
He hauled and delivered coal as a kid, landed on Normandy H9 and raised seven children - solid citizens, all.
Wish he were here to reassure us that the ship will make it safely to shore.
Posted by: Cathy at March 27, 2009 2:14 PMQuite simply, your father was a man of character. Our current leaders do not share that trait. They, instead, are "characters" who are in it for the power of the office. Search them for a hint of actual, not feigned modesty, or any impression that the world is not really all about them and how wonderful and smart they are. I suggest you will find none.
Posted by: mezzrow at March 27, 2009 2:31 PMDear Mr. Vanderleun,
My middle name is William, so in the family I was called Bill. My father called me Brylcream. My father had pet names for everybody. George Bush's penchant for giving people nicknames endeared him to me.
As to the main thrust of this post, I think you have discerned something fundamental about Sarah Palin's appeal. There are a lot of factors involved. Physical appearance, wholesomeness, policies but now that you have written this post I think that her plain talking honesty is more important than realized.
Regards,
Roy
A very nice homage. It sounds a lot like the Senator. Butch wax crew, well-tailored suits, white shirts freshly starched and laundered by the maid. I shined his dress shoes to a mirror shine for a nickel, which he grudgingly paid. I too still have the tie clasps and cuff links I occasionally wear for the grand vibe. And your story reminds of what Harry Crews's father told him when he was a lad in the Depression: "The fastest way to see how sorry a man is is to dress him in a suit."
That's when you separate the smooth guy from the man of character.
Greetings:
My father used to like to say, "Never trust a man in patent leather shoes." His logic was that those shoes indicated someone who wanted shined shoes but didn't want to do the necessary work.
He also used to say something about women with "painted eyebrows", but that's another story.
Posted by: 11B40 at March 27, 2009 4:10 PMMy father was a man for whom honor was essential. Did my father sell as many cars as he could have? Probably not, but he raised three boys well and without want.
My dad sold cars too, and he's a lot like this. I suspect his relentless exposure to the ethics of his fellow salesmen made him more like this.
Posted by: See-Dubya at March 27, 2009 4:42 PMYou have much to be thankful for in your father and what he believed in. And he would have much to be thankful for you in, and I believe especially in your political move to the right.
Posted by: Webutante at March 27, 2009 4:55 PMRight. As others have noted, in many ways you describe the man who raised me. He also spent his life in the auto business. Honesty was ingrained. Meeting commitments was essential. He lost his first business paying for my mother's terminal cancer bills. Later he had another
business, and as it was failing he nearly worried himself into the grave for fear he would have to declare bankruptcy. Fortunately he hung on long enough to sell; then he worked for years to pay off the remaining debt.
He went to war after he had 3 children (a travesty by a vindictive draft board chairman). He was widowed with young children. He worked until the day he went into the hospital for the last time. I never heard him complain.
I often think of him and wish I had told him how much I respected his life.
Thanks for the reminder.
Posted by: Oldflyer at March 27, 2009 5:09 PMMy dad told me about a car salesman he liked. They had my brother and I was on the way, and they didn't have much money. They needed a station wagon. This low key salesman showed them a Falcon wagon that was on the lot. It was plain-jane and was leftover from the prior model-year.
He didn't show them more than they could afford, he showed them what they needed. They took it.
I think they would have liked your dad.
Posted by: Mikey NTH at March 27, 2009 5:11 PMVery nice tribute to your Dad.
Your last line leaves me wondering...who's our repo-man?
Kinda makes me shiver - at least til it occurs to me to lean on what the Bible says about the big Repo.
Maranatha, Lord Jesus
Posted by: teresa at March 27, 2009 6:31 PMHow I miss my dad.
Now I miss yours too.
Posted by: Gray at March 27, 2009 6:47 PMJust reminded me that I am long overdue for telling my dad how much I love him.
Posted by: Andy at March 27, 2009 7:16 PMYou are always overdue for telling your parents you love them.
Do it now before you lose the chance. Once they are gone you'll never get it back.
Posted by: pdwalker at March 27, 2009 8:51 PMMy dad always said that credit was a great servant but a lousy master.
I believe our "repo man" to be George Soros, a pitiless monster.
Posted by: Joan of Argghh! at March 28, 2009 4:32 AMMy dad passed five years ago. I called my 87 year old mom last night, and told her my father was a very great man. She was very pleased, if taken aback.
A man's character may be composed within a silent endurance, and manage more good the less he is seen.
Not being seen is unimaginable for some.
Your father sounds like so many of the depression-era men who fought and won World War II, and provided the work ethic that was responsible for the post-war prosperity.
I salute them all -- your dad in particular -- and yet I wonder how it is that this generation produced such a feckless crop of children (Gerard and his readers excepted).
My guess is they wanted to spare their children the privations they themselves endured, but the unintended result was the 1960s, and the ensuing decades of soft-headed leftism, hedonism, universal victimhood, and the end of the meritocracy that used to be America.
Still, all that aside, your dad sounded like a heck of a guy.
Posted by: Mike Lief at March 28, 2009 9:30 PMMy 81 year old dad still has a flat top haircut and still usues Butch wax. He has had a flat top ever since I can remember. c.1970 I was the only kid in jr high that had a crew cut. My dad was convinced I would morph into a dope smoking hippie if I was allowed to grow my hair out to fit in with the other kids. I paid very dearly in hazing for that decision.
Posted by: feeblemind at March 29, 2009 9:53 AM"It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood." -- Karl Popper N.B.: Comments are moderated to combat spam and may not appear immediately. Comments that exceed the obscenity or stupidity limits will be either edited or expunged.
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