Fathers Day

Celebrating Fathers: The Aggie Wrench Collector

Erin2 Comments

I have been blessed by the fathers in my life: my father Stan Fanning, my grandfathers Paul Fanning and John Walsh, and my stepfather Pete Rathbone. So in honor of today, I’m re-posting a series of blogs I published two years ago, starting with Pete, perhaps the most generous man I’ve ever known. Happy Father’s Day, Pete!

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A series celebrating the men who have shown me the meaning of dignity and courage, as well as giving me a love for books, skiing, and RVing (and an appreciation for wrench collecting).

MomPeteSpain2011We arrived in Seattle as the Texas A&M Marching Band jammed on the cd player. P.T. (Pete) Rathbone steered his SUV with one hand and increased the volume with the other. My mom tapped along to the beat of drums while still immersed in reading the Wall Street Journal. And I sat in the backseat, cocooned by Aggie music, Cascade Mountains, and gray sky.

An Aggie alum, Pete plays the marching band every Saturday morning before the football team takes to the field. It’s a good-luck ritual, a reflection of Pete’s many interests, which range from farming to wrench-collecting to traveling.

Technically, Pete’s my stepfather but that word somehow reminds me of Cinderella and scrubbing floors–blame it on my strange imagination. Besides, Pete is more than a simple label—he’s friend, confidante, and co-conspirator. He’ll just as easily sit by your hospital bed as take you on a Caribbean cruise. He’s first to donate to a cause or tackle a pasture full of noxious weeds.

The Aggie music continued as we drove onto the ferry for Bainbridge Island. Pete, Mom, and I were silent, admiring the Seattle skyline to the rousing thrum of trumpets, tubas, and drums.

I had never cared much for marching band music before but that has changed, all because of a wrench-collecting Aggie with a generous heart.

——

The Idaho Statesman featured an article about Pete’s wrench museum, reprinted here in the Deseret News. And order his books here.

Click on the links below to read the rest of my Father’s Day series:

Celebrating Fathers: Catching Butterflies with the General

Celebrating Fathers: The RVing Gene

Celebrating Fathers: The Biggest Bear

 

 

Celebrating Fathers 4: The Biggest Bear

Erin3 Comments

DadBearMy father Stan Fanning wasn’t the fastest player in the National Football League, nor did he have the best arm.

But during the 1961 season, he earned his own superlative—the local media named him Chicago Bear’s “Biggest Bear.” His statistics—6 ft. 7in., 270 pounds—seem almost puny by today’s NFL lineup, but in 1961 when he swaggered onto the field and took his place as an offensive tackle, he was the biggest man in the game….

From my essay, Chicken Farmer to Chicago Bear (My Dad is My Hero, 2009). Read the rest here. My Dad Is My Hero

(Last in a series celebrating the men who have shown me the meaning of dignity and courage, as well as giving me a love for books, skiing, and RVing (and an appreciation for wrench collecting). Read the rest of the series: 1. Catching Butterflies with the General, 2. The RVing Gene, and 3. The Aggie Wrench Collector.)

 

 

 

Celebrating Fathers 3: The Aggie Wrench Collector

Erin1 Comment

Third in a series celebrating the men who have shown me the meaning of dignity and courage, as well as giving me a love for books, skiing, and RVing (and an appreciation for wrench collecting).

MomPeteSpain2011We arrived in Seattle as the Texas A&M Marching Band jammed on the cd player. P.T. (Pete) Rathbone steered his SUV with one hand and increased the volume with the other. My mom tapped along to the beat of drums while still immersed in reading the Wall Street Journal. And I sat in the backseat, cocooned by Aggie music, Cascade Mountains, and gray sky.

An Aggie alum, Pete plays the marching band every Saturday morning before the football team takes to the field. It’s a good-luck ritual, a reflection of Pete’s many interests, which range from farming to wrench-collecting to traveling.

Technically, Pete’s my stepfather but that word somehow reminds me of Cinderella and scrubbing floors–blame it on my strange imagination. Besides, Pete is more than a simple label—he’s friend, confidante, and co-conspirator. He’ll just as easily sit by your hospital bed as take you on a Caribbean cruise. He’s first to donate to a cause or tackle a pasture full of noxious weeds.

The Aggie music continued as we drove onto the ferry for Bainbridge Island. Pete, Mom, and I were silent, admiring the Seattle skyline to the rousing thrum of trumpets, tubas, and drums.

I had never cared much for marching band music before but that has changed, all because of a wrench-collecting Aggie with a generous heart.

——

The Idaho Statesman featured an article about Pete’s wrench museum, reprinted here in the Deseret News. And order his books here.

 

Celebrating Fathers 1: Catching Butterflies with the General

Erin2 Comments

First in a series celebrating the men who have shown me the meaning of dignity and courage, as well as giving me a love for books, skiing, and RVing (and an appreciation for wrench collecting).

The sun-baked sidewalk burned my feet, and I slipped my flip-flops back on. My sister and cousins scampered ahead, a blur of tan limbs and bouncing ponytails.

I struggled to keep up–at 7, I was the youngest of the bunch—but my grandfather John Walsh hesitated. Swinging a net, he reached his free hand out to me. “Come on, Erin,” he said. “We’ve got some butterflies to catch.” He smiled, his ever-present fedora tilting back on his head.

I skipped over to him and clutched his hand, infused with confidence by his simple touch. A few paces away, butterflies flitted among wildflowers. My sister and cousins bounded through the tall grasses, shouting, “Look at that blue one.” And, “Give me your net.”

John—all of his grandchildren called him by his first name, something started by one of my cousins—winked at me. Still grasping my hand, he raised the net and tiptoed toward a resting butterfly. It fluttered away, escaping capture, and John shrugged, pulling me farther into the field, farther into life, making me a full participant in the day.

It was always like that with John. Despite the responsibilities that he carried throughout his life—escorting the dead home from France during World War I, guiding students through their studies as a school superintendent, and devoting years of service to Idaho as its Adjutant General—he always had time for an encouraging gesture and kind word.

He enveloped people with his quiet enthusiasm. He had a gift for saying the right thing and an enormous sense of humor, singing, “laugh and the world laughs with you,” when someone grew weepy and chuckling along with movies like “Animal House,” which he took my sister and me to see when we were teenagers.

Our butterfly excursion ended in a grass-stained jumble—dirty knees, blackened feet, and sun-burned noses. As the butterflies soared over the field, John steered us home, where my grandmother waited, ice cream treats ready, and the fun continued into the night with board games. The next day promised the same endless playing.

Yet, among all the memories, butterfly-catching with my grandfather has remained particularly clear. It represents the many times he made his grandchildren feel like the most important people in the world. Even today, I can see him holding my hand and drawing me into the world, armed only with a wink, smile, and butterfly net.