for the record

Catching up with dad, I got a bit more insight into our family heritage. Dad told me that when he turned 13 years old, he was given his first shotgun. It wasn't a big gun, but in the culture of Oklahoma at that particular place and time, it was a rite of passage. It meant that dad could join the men to go hunting.

We all have rites of passage- most of ones I have been through have been less specific to a particular culture. Graduation from high school, graduation from college, graduation with a masters degree. There are other more prosaic ones too, the first time you commute to work, or go to a business meeting. The first time you get a car.

Dad also reminded me of what his grandparents did, both of them from Oklahoma. His mom's father, Harry Tracy Moore, ran a series of small rural restaurants, of the kind you see on the roadside sometimes, which served up traditional southern fare like chicken fried steak for truckers. One of them was called the Wrangler, and there dad had one of his first jobs busing tables and washing dishes. Apparently my great-grandfather was very economical- if he sold baked potatoes one night, he'd fry them up for fresh hash browns the following morning.

His father's father, James Oliver Perkins, held a variety of trades including horse trading and trucking. Dad told me that sometimes my great-grandfather would take him on some long distance trips, out to Montana and California, and they'd sleep out in the trailers at night. Bit of a far cry from the small luxury bath products and complementary bath robe at the Westin Riverwalk.