I was a daddy’s girl. I still am, even though my father passed away almost eight years ago at the age of 95. He was my mentor as well as, for the largest chunk of my life, my mother – a role that was sadly foisted on him after the death of my mum when I was young. I lived in a different continent to my father for most of my adult life but we couldn’t have been closer. It is largely in homage to him that I wrote my novel, X in Provence.
I was lucky to have had a dad with nine lives (death narrowly averted) who was as kind, compassionate and generous as he was iconoclastic, brilliant and humorous. He gave me the instruction book for understanding or trying to understand the world we live in – encapsulated in seven words: “Question everything, take nothing at face value.” In other words, think critically. True to his philosophy, on Sunday mornings in our house in north London, he would sit on the sofa with a stack of newspapers to read: the broadsheets as well as the tabloids. Once I asked him – I must have been 10 or 11 – when I saw the Sun and News of the World in the pile: “Dad why are you reading these, I thought they were rubbish?”
His answer stuck with me.
“You need to read from as many sources as possible. Do your own research. Then and only then can you make up your own mind as to what you believe is going on.”
He was no stranger to the media. My dad’s first job in the early 1950s was as a writer for radio. When television came along, he became a television producer, first in New York and later in Los Angeles. And when he turned his focus to publishing in London, he was often in the glare of the media.
Another tenet he passed to me: his hatred of the military-industrial complex. He joined the United States Marine Corp in 1940 under false pretences, told by recruiters it was a ticket to global travel. It sure was, on a troop ship to the death-trap trenches of Guadalcanal. So, when my father held forth about the evils of war, he knew of what he spoke. I still marvel at how he overcame the post-traumatic stress disorder that followed five years of servitude to the military, to cope with stresses galore in the many subsequent stages of his life, including the death of his wife and two daughters.
But his humour, that also lives inside me and still makes me laugh. I grew up hearing tragi-comic stories from each era.
There was the story about Mr. Orford’s candy store in Taunton, Massachusetts where he grew up. As a child, whenever he came into money, which is to say a single cent (this was the depression and his family were exceedingly poor), he would head to the tiny candy store near his home and spend hours and hours trying to decide what precious sugary delights to select. Mr. Orford never ever rushed him. He started his first business at the age of six, making and selling popsicles, but they all melted because it was hot and he had no ice. His first bankruptcy.
I especially loved hearing stories about Mexico, where I was born. My parents had moved to Mexico City to seek respite from life-altering events in America (described in my article, “Debunking Redford’s Quiz Show”, on taniruiz.substack.com). It was a Monday night and they’d invited the boss of Channel Two television and his wife over to dinner. The guests were due at the house at 9pm. This being Mexico, where being late is a national trait, they weren’t too surprised when 10pm came and they hadn’t shown up. But when the clock struck midnight with no sign of the guests and no telephone call, they shrugged their shoulders, thinking the pair had forgotten about the invite, and went to bed. The following Monday night at around nine thirty, when they were lounging at home, prepped for an early night, the doorbell rang.
Guess who stood on the front doorstep? Yes, the couple.
“We were expecting you to come last Monday, what happened?” my father said, surprised to say the least.
“Well, we couldn’t make it that day but we can make it tonight, so here we are.”
My mother didn’t bat an eyelid. The dinner she quickly prepared and served up is testament to her flexibility and spontaneity. She wasn’t fazed by much.
Talking about television, my father was invited to attend the debut, live broadcast of a show that he originated. It was scheduled to go on air at 8pm on a particular day. Off he went to the studio in the afternoon, thinking it would already be well into the preparation phase. But when he arrived at the TV studio, nothing was happening and no one was there.
“Has the show been cancelled?” he asked.
“No.”
“It’s going on live tonight?”
“Si.”
“Where is everyone?”
“They’ll be here in a little while”.
It was crazy. At four or five in the afternoon they started building the set and rehearsing the commercials.
“Shouldn’t you have a run-through of the show before It goes on?” my dad asked the director. This programme featured a panel of celebrities – two men and two women – and they had to identify the mystery star who came out with their face covered.
Seven o-clock and the set was still not ready nor the actors on the premises.
“Are you sure this is really going to go on at 8? My dad was anxious. The director shrugged and told his friend “Gringos. They don’t understand television.”
My dad had never seen anything like it before. Right before show-time they were still putting finishing touches on the set. “This is how we do things in Mexico,” was the explanation my dad got. Lo and behold, the celebrities turned up and just as 8pm struck, they went on stage and the director ordered, “okay, lights over here. Roll the cameras.” The show went on and it was a great success.
My father relished the telling of these and a large catalogue of stories that enriched my girlhood. Call it fate, karma or happenstance. I was lucky to have a father of his ilk.