About My Dad - It's Father's Day, After All

Born October 30, 1891 in Manti, Sanpete County, Utah, to William Jedediah and Margaret Kirk Brimley. That's my dad.

Wilford Charles Brimley. It's a good name, I think. I remember no shortening of his name. My mother always called him Wilford. I can hear her now calling to him.

At his tallest, he was 5'6" and that's not tall. I never knew him slender, never knew him with a full head of hair, although I'm sure he had one at some time.

My dad was a no nonsense kind of man, a get down to it and get it done man, a hard worker--or so I believe. Not that I would have noticed such qualities when I was a child. Except, I think I noticed the no nonsense part. Maybe I was too much about nonsense.

We were not close. My Aunt Allie says he was hard to get to know, hard to get close to. And yet my two sisters--one the oldest in the family, the other the baby--say they were close to him.

Both were Daddy's girls. I was not.

Here's my poem on the subject.

Daddy's Girl

In that window-walled

square room of yours

you play a fast clack clack song

on the L. C. Smith black keys.

Seated you are my height--

I can see the window's shine

on your head, my voice can speak

straight into your ear.

You do not look up

or stop your fingers

while I tell my wishes.

I think you must hear me.

In the flowered chair,

you hold my sister on your lap

as rain slaps the street outside

and runs down our long hill.

The lamp throws a yellow light

around you, yellows your head,

your teeth, your tongue as you laugh,

saying funny names, made up words

whose meaning I guess at.

You touch her hair, her face,

call her china doll.

It's an old poem. But I have written more charitably about him since and confessed an affection for him, an appreciation for him.

Does that mean I love him? I think so.

I know my mother did.