Rocks in Your Head

by Joanna Price

    “You’ve Got Rocks in Your Head!”  That was my father’s usual way of speaking to us kids.  He never cared for our ideas, and he certainly never solicited them. He never thought there was anything of much interest going on with kids—thoughts, concerns, desires.  Maybe he really thought there wasn’t anything up there but rocks, after all, nothing worthwhile.  We were just kids, so how important could our thoughts be?  Why would he care what we had to say?  Could he ever imagine someone at school being mean to us? Or our having a hard time with some school work?  Or our being afraid of the priests and nuns? Or my feeling sad about leaving my eighth-grade friends and going off to high school? Or my being afraid of boys and that’s why I chose to go to an all-girls high school? Did he ever know that teaching and nursing were the only careers I ever thought possible for a woman in 1969?  Could he ever imagine that I really wanted him to notice me and to talk to me? How could I tell him? Why would I think he would care?  I don’t think he ever imagined how important he was to me.  I don’t think he ever could have imagined how much I needed him to care about my thoughts and my feelings. 

    Of course, nobody ever cared about his thoughts or feelings.  His parents were poor, uneducated, and focused on surviving.  His parents lived on a farm in Costellucio Valmaggiore in the province of Foggia, Italy, population of 1,292. They grew olives and figs.  My grandfather made several trips to America alone, working and saving money before he had his wife and children join him here.  He worked in a factory and spoke broken English. My grandmother didn’t work outside the home, and she never did learn English.  There were 8 children.

    My grandparents lived a harsh life.  They were concerned with hard work and survival.  Showing love was definitely not a priority.  They could be harsh and cruel, using severe physical punishment often.  I doubt anyone ever told my father he was loved or valued.

    My father was the oldest boy.  He was twelve years old when he came to America.  Because they didn’t speak English, he and his brothers were put into first grade with 6-year-olds.  I guess they muddled through and picked up the language as best they could.  There was no instruction in English as a Second Language back then.

    During the Depression my grandfather lost his job, as so many did.  At age nineteen, my father was just a freshman in high school.  By then he had learned barbering by spending time in barbershops as an apprentice.  He quit school to join the Civilian Conservation Corps to help his family during the Depression.  The boys lived at camps all over the country. They worked in parks creating trails, digging ponds to collect rainwater for fire-fighting, and building stone buildings that still stand today.  They were paid $30 per month, and $25 of that was sent home to the families.  Since my father knew barbering, he made money giving haircuts to the guys in the camp for five cents each. 

    So, my father had a career as a barber.  He was a hard worker and very bright.  He earned his GED, and he took the necessary courses to obtain his barber’s license.  Of course, he became an American citizen and served in the Army during WWII.  He was sharp enough to run his own barbershop after he had worked in several other shops.  He supported his family of 4 children with that work and worked in it into his 80’s.

    When I was in high school, I tried to make conversation with my father.  I desperately wanted him to notice me.  Of course, my fear of him, my shyness, and my lack of conversational skill made this a total disaster.  I never could get him to speak to me.  I concluded he just did not know how to make small talk.  Imagine my astonishment one day when I was in the barbershop for a haircut when I heard him with his customers.  “Hey, Joe, how was your vacation?”  “How was the golfing?”  “Hi Bob, good to see you!”  He sure did know how to make small talk with his customers!  Maybe because they gave him money, and money was so hard to come by. 

    My father was abusive to my mother, as well.  He was intense and serious.  My mother was afraid of him, as we all were.  She told me that before they had children, he would slap her.  My mother worked in a factory and had little money. That didn’t stop my father from yelling and criticizing her when she used her own money to buy something small, such as a small table for the living room.

    I think one of his greatest regrets was that he was not able to attend college.  Once, when I was grown and had graduated from college and was out living on my own, he showed me his report card from his first and only year of high school.  Of course, he had excellent grades, and he was very proud of that report card.  He had saved it for so many years.

    My father saw education as the key to a better life.  Education was extremely important to my father, and he passed on those values to me and my two sisters, as well as to my brother.  In the 1950’s he would tell all of us, over and over, “Go to college and get your degree.  I don’t care what you do after that, just get your degree.”  I owe a great deal to my father for that encouragement. He probably didn’t even realize there was anything more available after a Bachelor’s degree. 

    Of course, I was still trying to gain his approval, even after I earned my Bachelor’s degree in Nursing.  I felt driven to achieve more, being a typical first-born.  I felt compelled to obtain a Master’s in Nursing.  That degree and teaching Nursing was not adequate for me.  I felt compelled to do more.  Medical school was next on the schedule for me.  After medical school I did residency training in Obstetrics and Gynecology and ran my own practice for 21 years.  Sadly, he did not attend my medical school graduation.  I was living 500 miles away, and he said, “She will graduate whether I’m there or not.”  He truly did not realize how important he was to me.  He missed out on the pride and the joy we could have shared.

    I had the most satisfying time with my Dad when he was in a nursing home with Alzheimer’s the last year of his life.  By then he was mellow.  That’s when he told me how beautiful the family’s farm in Foggia was and how much he wished he could go back to visit.  He was happy to have my attention at that point.  We had time alone together when I visited.  At the end of the visit, I would tell him I loved him.  We had never used those words before then.  He would respond, “Me too.”

    Dads, when your little girls tell you about the little things that don’t seem to matter, listen and pay attention.  Because, then, when the really big, important things come along, your little girl will know you are there for her to hear her and to believe her. Girls and women are too easily dismissed as being emotional or hysterical.  Little girls need a Hero and a Champion. You will be her Hero.