Recently, we (the sisters and our partners) went to my dad’s place for a goodbye brunch. He and his wife were heading back to Finland. Again. (Please see my blog post Bears, Kangas, and Kiwis, Oh My! for yet another account of this phenomena.) His wife, Oona, is Finnish, and about ten years his junior. When in Finland, Oona is a competent and highly-prized (per Dad, but I don’t doubt it) nurse. When in the United States, Oona spends days on end with my father, taping throw-rugs to the carpeted floor (presumably so they don’t trip on the rugs, in which case, why add rugs at all?), hanging bed sheets from the windows with fat binder clips for window-dressing, or painting landscapes while my father watches Cool Hand Luke ( …Casino, A Few Good Men, Taxi Driver…Clueless and Heathers was a pretty fun phase for the rest of us; a nice break from the violent scenes he freely acts out in public– instead we got, “whatever, major loser,” complete with the hand gestures).
Because, you see, despite her education and forty-plus years of experience, she isn’t licensed in the US, and therefore can’t practice nursing, and so she paints. To be fair, my dad has offered to take her to the airport so she can work as a baggage handler, or to buy her a dollar store to work in (“Hattie, you can work there, too!”). I kind of wonder if this, in part, is why they can’t seem to decide on which continent to stay: Oona wants to work, and dad gets homesick. And so they go and go and go with the flow until one of them breaks, and then they jump the country.
The end result of this shitty system that throws up barriers for immigrants seeking employment in their licensed field? An excessive number of oil paintings in the world and my home, and unannounced visits from my father and the gifts that he bears.
The first time my dad moved to Finland he had a lifetime of possessions to unload, but rather than consider the likes and dislikes of each daughter, he would do drive-bys, leaving nightmarish collections of trinkets and appliances on our respective porches. I would innocently leave my house for groceries, and return to an ironwood (“the most beautiful wood in the world”) figurine (really, just painted wooden seagulls glued onto a lump of ironwood “the heaviest fucking wood in the world.” Once, my dad caught Alice chasing me around the house with one of these ironwood creations; she was in her twenties at the time. He wasn’t happy) blocking my access to the front door. Which leaves me with the chore of dumping that shit at Goodwill.
My dad likes to tell us that “Elvis has the most beautiful voice in the world!” Which is not unlike when my then-nine-year-old niece declared Dude, Where’s My Car the best movie ever. So, we grew up listening to Elvis (and Neil Diamond; a lot of Neil Diamond. In fact we had multiple framed pictures of Neil (no, not signed… just pictures) hanging in the house, forever immortalized in the classic “hang an ornament on the tree” Christmas photo with Neil’s softened hazy picture in the background). And don’t get me wrong– I like Elvis. I even went to Graceland, though that had more to do with needing a destination for a road trip. I even own a couple of “best of” albums. So coming home to a box of Elvis CDs wasn’t too horrible. Or, it wouldn’t have been too horrible if the CD cases contained CDs, or contained the correct CD, or weren’t inexplicably sticky.
Why Yes, I Did Catalog the CDs I Received:
Don’t Forget Christmas:
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It was like a dying person giving away their belongings; I felt so sad (but not too sad that I couldn’t carefully curate the CD collection, noting to myself, “this is some crazy shit and someday I will be writing about it”). I considered hanging onto the CDs, just in case he returned (little did I know how often he would return), or maybe even shipping them to him in Finland. It was such a profound (and profoundly unexpected) reaction. It’s almost like maybe I really do love my dad (I do, I do… of course I do! But that doesn’t mean the relationship isn’t complicated, as evidenced by my last twenty-five-plus years in therapy).
The second time Dad left town he was car-less and unable to dump-and-run. Instead he had to rely on us to come pick his shit up. He had to sell us on his possessions. My dad likes to tell stories about his father’s days as a door-to-door salesman. It was post-WWII, and Grandpa returned stateside and was in need of work (I highly recommend that folks watch The Best Years of Our Lives about servicemen adjusting to civilian life post WWII), and I’m not sure what he was selling, but he was successful. Says my father. And how did he manage to be successful? Turns out, when someone opened their door, he blocked it open with his foot.
Very clever!
I can’t remember how old I was when it finally clicked that this is actually kind of fucked up. I can’t even imagine what I’d do. Probably buy something so this dude would get the fuck off my property. Nonetheless…. Very clever!
The thing is, my dad isn’t a salesman so much as a wheeler-and-dealer, and there is a difference. My dad can’t talk you into buying a used car, but he can get you a toilet wholesale, no problem. “Baby, do not buy a refrigerator until you talk to me first.”
So began the emails.
“Italian bookcase. Very Expensive!” It was a hideous glass-and-brass thing, perfect for our suburban home circa 1985, but no good in 2002. “Who wants it?”
“This is a microwave, barely used. Brand new! Maybe for your basement?”
“Oona has a bread-maker. Six months new!”
“A leather couch. Very heavy. Good construction!”
Waitaminute… leather couch? That’s another thing: my dad doesn’t do cheap or economical. He is a class-act, and I knew this couch would be a quality item (although possibly hideous). Chad and I just finished remodeling our basement, and we had a lovely family room which sat empty of furniture. I leapt at this offer.
“Bring a friend, it’s heavy,” advises dad.
“Does it have a hide-a-bed?” I asked. “Why is it so heavy?” Because, here’s the thing: the mass unloading that happened for his first trip to Finland included me getting an Ethan Allen writing desk: good wood, simple design.
“Very heavy,” he warned. “I’ll bring Jeff.”
Jeff was a perpetually unemployed drifter who lived in the economically depressed community in which my Dad ‘s beach house was located. Dad would occasionally employ him to help with house painting, or other manual labor. Turns out that for this big move, Dad shipped in Jeff to help. So, they pull into my drive, and they both get out of the truck wearing matching slacks and button-ups, my dad and Jeff (or as I began referring to them as “dad and his longtime-companion,”) but rather than say hello to me, Dad makes a beeline to our neighbor who is in his front yard (the husband, who quit a well-paying job to follow his dream of being, no shit, a merchant marine, was always home and fussing in his yard).
Leather gloves in place, Dad introduces himself, and then pronounces them the “least dubious” (whitest?) of our neighbors, before returning to the truck to help Jeff unload the desk, which they proceed to carry into my front yard, and place on the lawn as a perch from which my father could perform, with Jeff acting as his Greek chorus and the neighbors and myself looking on. No shit, he sat on the desk in my front yard and told stories. Meanwhile, I can’t help but note that the table is real wood, and yet slender. Light. I could have moved this desk myself, and have done so many times since acquiring it.
I hope you can see why I was not convinced that this couch would require three of us. But, given that Chad and I didn’t own a truck, and weren’t really up to renting one just for a couch, we brought along A Third Person. My friend Mike is the only person we knew with a truck, and also the only person who was willing to help. For me, one of the hallmarks of adulthood is no longer moving your own furniture, and no longer helping others move. But, for Mike, he will always help others move because “it feels good to leave at the end of the day, knowing that you don’t have to unpack.”
Mike picks us up in in his pickup-sized pickup, by which I mean nothing excessive, just a pickup, perfect for two, and snug for three. I let Chad take the front seat, and I took the jump seat in back, which faced sideways. I remember being little and our neighbors had a truck like this and I LOVED the concept of the jump seat, all folded up and hidden in the cab. Not the same feelings as an adult. We direct Mike to dad’s apartment. Dad’s instructions were to enter his parking garage, and then drive up the ramps until we see his car “pointing at you with finesse.” No floor or stall number. Just… finesse. I found this vague direction annoying and didn’t want to force MIke to drive in circles around this parking lot, looking for my father’s car, but that was wasted annoyance because we do easily identify Dad’s car and it was indeed parked with finesse.
Dad meets us in the garage, and I introduce him to Mike. Careful to leave his leather gloves in place, he shakes Mike’s hand. We proceed to dad’s apartment and make a grab at the couch, which is REALLY FUCKING HEAVY. How is it possible to have a couch weigh this much? And how can something this big have absolutely nothing to grip? Just smooth leather, rounded edges. Which makes navigating the hallway of this 1920s apartment building a huge pain in the ass. Can you turn it on it’s side? (First, HOW? There’s nothing to hold to pivot, and second, did I mention that it was heavy?). Also, there just isn’t space for a third person to grip the un-grippable couch, leaving Chad and Mike to move the couch, with dad offering tips, and me flitting around, touching the couch, making jokes, trying to make it all okay.
I’m not sure how we got it out of my dad’s place. It’s probably like giving birth: once you get the couch out of the apartment and into the hallway, there’s no going back.
But seriously, there’s a brain waste with unemployed and underemployed educated and skilled immigrants who can’t get work. For the sake of my home, currently adorned with an absurd number of landscape oil paintings (there’s one in particular that I had to take down because every time Michael saw it, he would say “It’s unfinished.” No– that’s fog. See? Just fog on the mountain. “It looks unfinished. We should finish it for her.” Sigh…), we need to consider making some legislative changes. More here. Similar issues face military spouses who work in licensed occupations and are moved from state to state, country to country. More here.