I Guess a Milestone of Sorts...

Life is math. That may seem like a funny pronouncement from someone who did not pass college algebra till he was 47 years old. I mean I could do math. I could balance a check book, figure the gas mileage on a car and eventually had a job where I plugged numbers into various algebraic formulas to calculate results to produce productive results for the rest of the work shift. I trace my scholastic math failings back to 1967 when I had a teacher I really loved and he loved all the same things I did such as reading and music so there was not much time for math. In East Texas in 1967 the house was not air conditioned and there was only one channel on the TV and it did not seem like math was going to be important. Eventually houses had air, TV became binge worthy and I got a mark on paper that caused people to sit up and say,  "Whoa!, dude can math." 

Today is my dad, Gene's birthday and born in 1925, let's do the math. He would have been 98 years old. My mom passed in 2019 at 95 and often wondered what kind of little old man he would have looked like but we did not get to see that since he passed away in 1991. Here is where we come to some equal numbers. He was 66 years old. I turned 66 years old earlier this year. I am the same age as my dad when he passed away. All those Wallace brothers passed away at various ages between 60 and 72.          

I once heard a doctor call it "three strikes and you are out." My dad cut little stubby King Edward cigars in half. He smoked one stubby and saved the other for latter. He was in the army landing on Omaha Beach in WW2 on the second day of the invasion of Europe which today, in addition to being his birthday is the anniversary of that event. He turned 19 and witnessed the remains of the carnage of June 6th, the initial landings. Hopefully no one tuning 19 today has an experience like that as a birthday present. After the war he worked in a factory. That's the three strikes. Smoking, military service and working in a factory.

I've never been in the service and it's been quite a few years since I smoked or worked in a factory. Maybe I'm eligible for the all clear.   

Back to that math I was 34 years old when my dad died. I was really just getting started, going through those early years of work, family, marriage and kids that take so much of your time and with him suddenly gone I feel like I and he missed a lot of things together. 

More math. Three out of four of my kids are older than I was when my dad passed away. Let's do that math. They are closer to my age that I ever was to his. 

Left to right uncles Sammy, Leonard, Bill, Don, Gladys "Granny Wallace" and my dad, Gene. All of them gone too soon. As I talk to my various cousins, some older than me, some younger I realize how many different lens we flip through as if at some kind of cosmic optometrists examination viewing actions, experiences, relationships, our lives with these men and so much more that the numbers I have figured with today is only a start to try and tell the story.      

No blog post here would be complete without a fishing report. Yes, me and my dad caught a lot of fish. I did not keep count. I am keeping count of the fish I catch with my kids and grandkids. Hopefully it will take some high level math to total those numbers. After all I have the proof I can handle that.  

https://www.venmo.com/u/Carl-Wallace-23