(Friday, October 30)

My dear old dad would have been 90 today.

He went to his grave — 30 years ago this June — at the age of 61, still believing in Adam and Eve.

He thought evolution was a crock.

Good for him, because there were few better men.

He went to war, fought the good fight overseas, and lived to enjoy the freedom earned by the sacrifice of many who did not come home from that war.

He could believe what he wanted, and he could choose the faith that bolstered that belief.

That's what democracy is all about.

He would no doubt be blown away by the world of today. When he died, on Father's Day 1980, there were no ATM machines and no automatic debit.

He sold insurance for a living and, every evening, he would leave our home to make his collection rounds — knocking on doors to collect meager premiums on meager policies.

Now a bank's computer does all that stuff.

There was no Internet, of course. There was no 500-channel television universe. No cable, no satellite TV. You had an aerial on your roof.

There were no Marty Robbins records on CD because there were no CDs — only vinyl.
His home entertainment centre was a turntable. There were no iPods holding a thousand songs.

And, because there was no Internet, there was no Facebook, no YouTube, no My Space and no Twitter.

But people didn't tune out either.

People talked.