My father’s car, baseball and Betsy Ross’ petticoats

When he died in 1995, my father was still driving the yellow Datsun he bought off the showroom floor in 1971.

Maybe it had something to do with living through the Great Depression, perhaps following the Swedish proverb, “Don’t buy a pig while it’s still in the bag.” In other words, don’t make rash decisions. So, yeah, think long and hard before buying that new vehicle.

If you haven’t noticed by now, Father’s Day is coming up Sunday, and if you are a dad, I hope you get what you deserve. Like most guys I know, I’ve experienced fatherhood both ways. Being a father and having a father. When you’re little, your father sets the standard, and when you’re grown up, you might use your father as a template, but after that, you’re on your own and have to sort out how to do it right.

For many of us, there were times when things weren’t all rosy with our dads. Times like, for instance, ahem...puberty, when mom and dad both seemed a little weird, and I know that now because I probably seemed a bit strange to my own kids during those years.

My dad is no longer around, but I find myself thinking about him, his ways, his corny expressions, more than ever. That stuff stays deep inside and pops up unexpectedly, probably at those moments when we need it.

This Sunday, remember to tell your dad you love him, forgive him, or thank him, whatever the case may be. I’m sure he’s done the best he knew how to do.

Frankly, if my dad was still around today, something tells me he would still be puttin’ around in that rattletrap of a car.

Isn’t there something people say about hanging on to old stuff if you haven’t used it for three years? Am I becoming my dad? Like Dirty Harry facing the bad guy, I have to ask myself, “Have I hung on to that broken floppy disk drive for three years, or was it 10? Well, have I punk?”

While I’ve never watched it, there’s a TV show called Hoarders, and I may not be there yet, but I fear I may be on my way. I mean, who’s going to want that obsolete camcorder or that broken TV I’ve been meaning to get fixed? I guess everybody hangs on to stuff they don’t really use anymore. Like exercise equipment. And clothes that don’t fit you because you quit using the exercise equipment, which ends up neat-o flower trellis for the yard.

While we’re on the subject, with warm weather well upon us, it’s time to put away that winter wardrobe and bring out the stuff from last year—if they still fit. And now, we get to the heart of the matter: getting into last year’s summer clothes.

My new rule: One carrot, one apple, a bunch of walnuts. Once a day. That’s my new system for living healthy and not being too embarrassed to wear bathing trunks in public.

I got that diet advice from something that cropped up on the internet. Of course, that means I’m forgoing the umpteen other competing weight loss ideas I’ve found there, and that’s okay because I, frankly, had not followed any of them.

We, like our fathers, just do what we can.

Veering off here, as is a ritual every Spring, and with only one more week before the summer solstice, I went to a baseball game last weekend. As much as I love the game itself - the skill, the strategy, the suspense of each pitch, all that - the thing that gets me a little weepy at the baseball park is when all the players line up along the first and third baselines and doff their caps to Old Glory for a rendition of the national anthem. Well, the same goes for all of us up in the stands.

I’ve got to throw in here that although you see the flag every day at places like city hall and the post office when you’re in a foreign country thousands of miles from home and people you don’t know are trying to kill you, seeing the flag is like a seeing a little bit of home. A reminder that America’s got your back.

On that note, tomorrow is Flag Day, celebrating the adoption in 1777 of the first national flag made by Betsy Ross. And I’ve always thought it’s cool that the stars were made from her unmentionables. At least, that’s what I was led to believe in the fourth grade. I also thought that girls were icky, and boy, was I ever wrong about that, as well.

On checking my trusty almanac, besides Flag Day, tomorrow is also National Pig Callers Day.

In case you’re wondering, yes, pigs can’t resist “Sooo-weee-pig-pig!” It’s like saying, “Come and get it! Dinnertime!”

I might answer that call myself. Just remember to add some red or green to my slop bucket.