I’m thankful this Thanksgiving Day for my parents, Charles and Eileen Flora.
The more I learn about other people’s experiences growing up with hideously dysfunctional families, the more I appreciate what my parents gave me.
My dad enjoyed a beer or two but I can never recall seeing him drunk. Both of my parents were smokers during the 18 years I lived with them, but then so was almost everyone else. To their credit, both of them quit smoking in their 50s.
We weren’t wealthy, but we were comfortable. My childhood in the 1950s was straight out of “The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet” and “Leave it to Beaver.”
My dad was an independent insurance agent, Realtor, and expert farm appraiser. He was a founding member of the Delphi (Ind.) Chamber of Commerce and served on the Delphi-Deer Creek Consolidated School Board and was board president during the construction of a new high school in the early 1970s. He also served as a deacon and an elder in the Delphi First Presbyterian Church. That said, he was a very modest and self-effacing guy who never sought the spotlight.
My mother was a registered nurse, but she was a stay-at-home mom from the time I was born until I was well into grade school. Then she worked as nurse for Dr. George Wagoner – a job that meant she got lots of calls at home in the evenings and on weekends when patients had problems that they didn’t want to bother Doc Wagoner with.
Being an only child, I got all of my parents’ attention and support.
They were honest, moral, hard-working Americans and whatever good I’ve done in my life, I owe to them and their example.
1 comment:
Well said John. I could say the same ALMOST word for word....Thanks for saying it for me. I think your Dad, his brother John and my Dad were the closest among the Floras who for some reason are spread out from coast to coast. I very much enjoyed reading this. I am also enjoying the book you recommended, When You Come Home. Thanks for that too! Your Ohio Couxin, Eric Flora
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