Good fathers and sons

Beatrice and Earl Orick with son Ed in the 1970s. COURTESY PHOTOS

According to the United States Census Bureau, 49.2% of nearly 23 million resident Floridians are men. Florida men.

That means about 11,270,000 C-Yers — the chromosome Y crowd — have been tagged with the title “Florida Man.”

You probably know what that popularization means, but if not, let me share some past headlines.

“Florida man gets tired of waiting at hospital, steals ambulance, drives home.”

Or, “Florida Man charged with assault with a deadly weapon after throwing alligator through Wendy’s drive-thru window.”

Or, “Florida cop claims Burger King put dirt in his food —investigation reveals it was seasoning.”

But there’s another kind of Florida Man, I’ve learned: the Good Father Florida Man. Those teaching their sons to be future GFFMs.

Does that mean we love our mothers, wives and daughters with the same intensity and promise we love our sons? That we treat people fairly and kindly when possible, we keep our word if we can, and we try like hell in any endeavor? Does it mean we keep cool in the face of hateful behavior and never mistreat or disdain people weaker or slower than we are? That we stay physically and mentally tough, we don’t back down from trouble, and we meet our responsibilities as best we can?

Sure, it means all that and a lot more. Life is complicated, though, and people are imperfect. That’s part of the fun. You do what you can, because — as a man raising and teaching sons (and daughters) — you acknowledge that you’re one of the imperfect ones, too.

Almost 45% of American men between 15 and 49 have had children, says the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. We’re averaging about two per father (and mother) these days, apparently. If roughly half those children are also males, then in Florida, where 45% of our 11,270,000 men have had children, we chromosome Y-ers have produced roughly 4 million Florida boys.

That’s a lot of Florida Man.

Ed Orick with wife, Susan; daughter, Maddy; and son, Cody.

Many can define a good father more precisely than I just did, but I think most of us wing it, often based on what we’ve seen our fathers do. And sometimes based on what they should have done, but didn’t do.

I was reminded of all this the other day when I wrote a column about leaplings, people born Feb. 29.

Ed Orick, a Florida Weekly reader from Juno, wrote me back. Leap day was always sad for him, he told me, because his father died on Feb. 29, 1980.

We began to exchange notes. Although we didn’t directly discuss it, I realized that in being so close to his remarkable dad, he had likely learned how to treat his own son, and other people. That happened to me, too.

Ed Orick’s story is an extraordinary but perhaps not too uncommon American tale. He agreed to let me share it with you, abridged here only for length.

“My dad was a tenant farmer all his life in northeast Arkansas, about 80 miles northwest of Memphis, (near) a town called Paragould. Our cash crop was cotton, but each farm was limited on how many acres of cotton you could plant in those days, so we also farmed soybeans and corn. And yes, my siblings and I grew up picking the stuff until we all eventually flew the coop. I’m 79 now, the youngest of nine, with just an 88-year-old brother and me the only two left. He’s still in Arkansas.

“My dad, Earl, was born in Illinois but his family migrated down to Arkansas when he was just months old, in 1902. He and my grandfather were both square dance fiddlers, likely from (Scottish ancestry). Both sides of my family arrived in the states at least 300 years ago, probably more.

“I married a New York Italian, Susan, whose dad is still with us at 94. I have to just smile when he pontificates on the hardships his ancestors had coming across on a steamship, to be greeted at Ellis Island in the 1920s. My dad’s side probably came in through Jamestown on a wooden sailer, bought a pair of mules, and headed west.

“My mom, Beatrice, was born and raised in Arkansas, pretty sure (of English descent), and the story goes the original guy came in at Charleston, became the foreman of a plantation whose owner’s daughter took a shine to him and they eloped and headed West on horseback. Several generations later that bunch had made it to northeast Arkansas.

“That brings us to another elopement. My mother’s mom passed giving birth when my mom was 8. So, she was raised by a single dad. My dad became the head of household at 18 when his dad died of a heart attack, supporting his mom and a house full of older girls and younger boys. They were neighbors, so when he was 22 and my mom 16 they eloped and she moved in with all the other kids. Her dad never really forgave her or my dad. So, for many years we were the black sheep.”

Mr. Orick left his cotton-picking life to go to college in St. Louis and later take a job with The 7Up company, based in Colorado, and driving to bottling plants all over the west.

He and Susan have raised two children, son, Cody and daughter, Maddy, in a big swirl of family stories and values that probably have a lot to do with Earl, an Arkansas tenant farmer.

“The past is never dead. It’s not even past,” wrote William Faulkner. In teaching his son, Ed, how to do it right, old Earl remains with us still, one more Good Father Florida Man, whether counted by the census or not. ¦

The post Good fathers and sons first appeared on Charlotte County Florida Weekly .