Quirky and Irreverent

Dad’s sense of humor left us a way to deal with life

My father, Joseph Altschuler, had always been a man of his word. He kept all his promises, except one: He told me he would never die. Sadly, he broke that promise on Sept. 24, 2008. That morning, he never woke up.

Dad was 89, so I can’t say his passing was unexpected. It was, however, sudden. Unlike many other people that age, he was in relatively good health and remained remarkably active until the end. His mind was sharp, his memory clear and his wit relentless. In fact, if he had known he would die that day, he would probably have devised a joke for the occasion.

Obviously, for my mom and me Dad’s passing was a terrible blow. Because it was so sudden, there was no last “goodbye,” no final “I love you.” I realized, too late of course, that I never really told him how much he meant to me.


Tears and laughter
There is a thin line between tears and laughter, and in the past months I have walked that line often. But I have discovered that remembering my father’s cheery disposition and unfailing sense of humor – which he maintained despite a life of hardship – gives me a treasure-trove of happy memories I can chuckle at when the going gets rough.

I also look at the photographs, such as the ones from my daughter Sabrina’s wedding in July 2007. Defying convention, Dad wore a white suit, which, he said, matched not only the bride’s gown but also the color of his own hair (and yes, he still had a full head of curly hair).

He was a master of deadpan comedy, delivering his lines in an impassive, matter-of-fact style that would make many professional comedians envious. For example, immediately after the wedding ceremony, as the bride and groom were exiting the church to the cheers of the crowd, Dad approached the happy couple and asked: “So tell me, kids. How is married life?”


Don’t worry, be happy!
This is not to say that Dad didn’t have a “serious” side. After all, he had lived through the war in Europe and came to this country without a penny in his pocket. Yet, through hard work and not a cent of public assistance (he was very proud of that), he managed to raise a family and put aside enough money to leave my mom relatively comfortable financially.

Still, like many people who grew up poor, Dad worried that the money would run out. Throughout the years, whatever savings he had he put in different banks so he wouldn’t lose everything in case the bank collapsed. (In that respect, Dad turned out to be a true visionary.)

And he was a chronic, incurable worrier. He didn’t just worry about actual, real occurrences, either. No. He would hypothesize about the “what if” scenarios, some of which were so unlikely they could happen only in a far-fetched sci-fi movie.

One day, he announced he was done with worrying.

“I found a perfect solution,” he said. “Everybody is outsourcing these days, so I decided to outsource the worrying.”

“How are you going to do that, Dad?” I asked.

“I will hire some guy to worry for me. Do you think $100 a day is a fair price to pay?”

“But you can’t afford $100 a day, Dad,” I said, laughing.

“So what? Let him worry about that.”

And that, in a nutshell, sums up my dad’s endearingly quirky and irreverent spirit. I wonder whether he knew this would be his greatest legacy, because, at the end of the day, that’s what I hold on to.

This combination of wit and life-derived wisdom is what made Dad, well, Dad. It makes me feel somewhat better to know that, even as I am writing this, he is probably cracking up everyone in heaven.


 

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A journalist and an award-winning writer, Helena Bachmann Milligan is the author of a novel, "Teeth in a Pickle Jar" Dad was her number one fan.