Reflecting upon Everett's Lessons: Four Years Later

This blog was originally started in the summer of 2011 to document our family RV trip, an experience made possible by generosity of my father, Everett Smith, who died in September of 2010 from Alzheimer's disease. Indeed, we named this family vacation "The Everett J. Smith Memorial Roadtrip" in his honor. We had such a good experience traveling up and down the East Coast that summer that we decided to do the same thing on the West Coast in the following year. All of the exploits from those two journeys are chronicled in the pages of this blog.

It's now been four years since Dad passed and two summers since our last family roadtrip. Keiko and Amaya, now age 12, are almost unrecognizable from their photos of two years ago. Summer camps and soccer events take the place of family roadtrips these days. Although the specific activities may vary, summertime still makes me reflect on my Dad and what he meant to me.

This summer, opportunities for reflection were particularly plentiful. My sister, Ellen, convinced me to run in New York City Marathon as part of team Athletes to End Alzheimer's. As the training miles have steadily increased, so too have the minutes and hours alone with my thoughts. Over time, my memories of Dad's end-of-life struggles have tended to fade and those of our good times together as a child and young adult have grown more vivid.

For the purpose of fundraising for the Alzheimer's Association in Dad's honor, I have struggled with how to describe who he was as a person. This is the same struggle that I faced when trying to write Dad's eulogy four years ago. The answer here, of course, is that it is an *impossible* task. It's difficult enough for me to articulate who Dad was in my own eyes, let alone what he might have meant to others. So, instead, of trying to paint another picture of Dad, I've decided to copy a transcript of that eulogy here. Honestly, I haven't looked at this in four years. It's the hardest thing I've ever had to write and and it's still difficult for me to read. Nothing I could compose would truly do Dad justice, but here's my best effort. If you've read this far, thank you for honoring Dad's memory.

Lessons from Everett

My Dad was fond of lessons. He loved to learn new things. He treated every experience as an opportunity to learn something new and to make himself a more educated person—a better person. Dad was an accomplished student: attending Phillips Exeter Academy, graduating from Williams College Magna Cum Laude, then earning an MBA at Harvard Business School and becoming a Certified Public Accountant. In the words of an old timer from Biddeford, Maine, “he was wicked smaaaat! But I bet he never told you any of this…

For all of his accomplishments as a scholar and a businessman, I mostly remember my dad as a teacher. Maybe it was in his blood? His brother, George Jr., was a teacher. His Aunt Guilla McCarthy was a teacher, as were his Uncle Edwin and Aunt Florence Smith as well as his cousins David and John Smith. Dad even married into a family of teachers. John Freitas was a teacher and so was my Mom and lots of other members of her family. Eventually, even Ellen and I grew up to be teachers. Maybe it was just his relationship to me as father to son, but I remember my Dad as a teacher. A teacher of lessons. Lessons that served me well as a child and lessons that continue to serve me as an adult, a husband, and as a teacher and father myself.

Lessons from Everett.

It wouldn’t surprise me if every one of you in the Church today had learned some kind of a lesson from Everett. And I have little doubt that if we were able to apply some more of Everett’s lessons, we would all be better people for it.

Some of the lessons were simple explicit ones:

—always say “please” and “thank you”

—do your homework

—brush your teeth….with vigor!

—wash your paws ….and don’t forget to use soap!

Other lessons were more abstract and took a while to sink in. Instead of just spelling them out for us, he did what all great teachers do—he made us figure them out on our own.

For a kid, this could be incredibly annoying:

Hey Dad, how do you spell “committee”?

—The same way it’s always spelled.

Yeah, what way is that?

—It never changes, Tom.

Come on Dad! How do you spell “committee”?

—OK. I’ll give you a hint. It begins with the letter “C” and I’m certain that it’s in the dictionary. Go look it up!

Dad loved reading Aesop’s fables to Ellen and me when we young children because they all had lessons at the end—and he’d really milk those for all they were worth. He’d read the story of the Ant and the Grasshopper, for example, and then ask us,

So, what do you think is the moral of the story?”

—Ummm…if you fool around all summer, you’ll starve in the winter?”

That’s right! And if you get your work done first, you can still have plenty of time to play later.

That was a moral that Dad lived by, for sure. It was a lesson that my grandfather had impressed upon him long before that. I remember him telling me that in college, my “Papa” would get right to work on his studies after class and then later that evening he would announce “who wants to join me for a Peterson at the diner?” (Apparently a Peterson was some kind of an egg sandwich!)  His friends would moan that they hadn’t even started their work for the next day, as Papa would march off for his celebratory evening snack.

I never really understood the appeal of an egg sandwich, or why it would be fun to eat one without your friends…but I still managed to have that lesson firmly imprinted on me just like my Dad and his father before him.

The very best Lessons from Everett—the ones that continue to make the biggest impact upon me as an adult—are the ones he taught purely by example. I didn’t fully understand the importance of his actions as a kid, but there are hundreds of lessons that Dad taught me indirectly that I’ve come to appreciate since I moved away from home—and even more for which I’m just coming to realize the significance now. I’d like to share a few of these lessons today with the hope that they’ll ring true for you too.

Lesson from Everett:  1.  Be generous.

Be generous with your time, generous with your praise, and generous with your wallet.

Dad worked so hard to provide for his family, yet he always made time for us and for the people who needed him. He was always quick to praise someone for a good job. Dad gave blood every time the blood drive came through town for as long as any of us can remember. We estimate that he donated between 10 and 15 gallons of blood in his lifetime. Only after Dad moved into the nursing home and Mom took over the bill paying chores did we realize what a munificent benefactor he had been. The number of donation requests arriving in the mail was astounding and it turned out that Dad had quietly been making contributions to all of them for years. No fanfare. No expectation of acknowledgement—other than a tax deduction!

Lesson from Everett:  2.  Be kind to your sister.

She’ll be there for you long after we’re gone. Cherish your family.

Keiko and Amaya, did you hear that? Be kind to your sister. I bet you thought I made that up. I stole it from Grampy…..Madi and Henry, you too!

Lesson from Everett:  3.  Plant a tree.

Recycle. Don’t waste. Pick up trash that you find on the ground. Appreciate and respect nature and leave a place better than you found it.

Ellen’s lifelong friend, Bethie Flanagan, who now lives in Boulder, Colorado, reminded Ellen of Dad’s commitment to recycling back when we were kids before anyone else she knew did such a thing. Those values of “waste not want not” that he learned growing up during the Great Depression are in vogue again now, but were a way of life for Dad.

Uncle Johnny also reminded us about all of the volunteer work that Dad would do at Camp Billings when camp wasn’t in session. He was a member of the Camp Board of Directors, but Dad also visited camp and got his hands dirty mowing and cleaning up. Back when I was a Cub Scout, Dad planted innumerable pine saplings at camp. I visited Camp two days ago and those trees now surround the ball field in a beautiful green ring as a testament to Dad’s care and foresight.

Lesson from Everett:  4.  It’s OK to cry in here, but get yourself together before you leave.

Dad always maintained his composure—perhaps sometimes to a fault. But when you needed to know that there was someone standing by you who was under control, you could always count on Dad. Steadfast. Cool a cucumber.

Lesson from Everett:  5.  Check your math.

It’s easy to make a silly mistake and it only takes a little bit more effort to avoid that embarrassment. If he ever took us out to eat at a restaurant, Dad would never pay until he had recalculated the check himself. The total was correct most of the time, but every so often he’d discover an error. If the error was in our favor, Dad would always call the waitress over to let her know that she had shortchanged herself.

Lesson from Everett:  6.  Always do your best.

Take pride in what you do. Nobody can ask you do anything more than your best.

Lesson from Everett:  7.  Cheer for the opposing team when they make a good play.

For the love of the game and to give credit where credit is due for a job well done.

Lesson from Everett:  8.  Don’t use twenty words if two will do.

Dad was true Vermonter who prized verbal economy. He had an enormous vocabulary, but he was always precise with his word selection. Dad loved a famous story about Vermont-born President Calvin Coolidge who so spoke so sparsely that he was nicknamed Silent Cal. A woman approached President Coolidge at a White House dinner party and said, “A friend bet me that I couldn’t get you to say more than two words to me.” President Coolidge paused and then replied: “You Lose.”

Lesson from Everett:  9.  Treat everyone with respect.

Whether it’s the CEO of the company or the cleaning lady, remember that everyone matters. Greet everyone with a smile and a kind word. If a Smith Batchelder and Rugg employee ever said, “I work for Everett” he would say No!” you work with me—and he meant it.

Lesson from Everett:  10.  Get some exercise.

Take the time to get outside. Take a hike, play a game, or go for a run—preferably in purple short-shorts and a tattered T-shirt.

Lesson from Everett:  11.  Don’t take yourself too seriously.

Be yourself. Know who you are and don’t worry what other people think….

Lesson from Everett:  12.  Sing, hum, and whistle a tune whenever possible.

The recessional hymn you’ll hear in a few minutes is one that we all remember Dad humming after church on Sunday…..and for the entire remainder of the day.

Lesson from Everett:  13. Hug your son.

Or else he’ll endure a lifetime of awkward moments with touchy-feely people. Dad was not an outwardly affectionate person in a conventional sense. A firm handshake was the normal way that we would greet each other after being apart for some time. But you don’t have to be a great hugger to be a great dad. Much more important than any hugging was the feeling that there was never, ever, any doubt that dad was there for me and that he would have done anything for me. He drove me to hockey games and cheered at my cross country meets (not exactly a spectator-friendly sport) and helped me with my homework (by showing me where the dictionary was). I was truly blessed to have Everett as my Dad.

Lesson from Everett (the last one for today):  14. Make the best of the situation.

Dad was always a “glass-is-half-full” kind of guy. He always seemed to find something positive or some ray of hope in even the worst situation. I managed to follow this lesson for most of my life, but when Dad started to fail, it was tough to see the bright side of the situation. It seemed particularly cruel that someone who’s identity was so much defined by his knowledge and sharp wit would be robbed of those very qualities.

I was angry for a long time. Here was a guy who had worked like a dog all of his life and all he wanted to do now was relax and play tennis and volunteer his time for organizations like “meals on wheels” but it wasn’t long after he retired that he wasn’t really able to do any of that. How as that fair?!

After all, Dad was the Ant in that parable, not the Grasshopper! Right?

But one day, after visiting my Dad, and finding it so hard to say goodbye to someone who seemed very little like the man I knew just a few years earlier, I came to realize that Dad would not want me to be angry. Dad would want me to remember the good times and go about my life taking care of my family. In fact, he told me as much on a walk down the beach in Maine twenty-something years ago.

So, after that day, I decided that when I would say goodbye, I would imagine my Dad in a much happier place in our lives. I know that you all have memories like these, so I invite you to follow Everett’s Lesson to make the best of the situation and call on those good memories when you can. I’ll just finish by sharing a few of the images that I recalled when I would say goodbye to my dad over these last few years.

I would imagine saying goodbye to the Dad who had just finished tying up my skates at the uncovered outdoor ice rink by the Middle School. Then he would trudge back home in the cold to warm up until he regained enough feeling in his fingers so that he could tie his own pair of skates. Bye dad. See you in a few minutes.

Or I would imagine saying goodnight to the Dad sitting at the dining room table with slippers on his feet, a glass of Pepsi and a single Freihofer’s chocolate chip cookie in front of his old-fashioned adding machine…watching Johnny Carson in the background as he continued his work late into the night. “Tick-a-tick-a-tick, badarumph!” Tick-a-tick-a-tick, badarumph!“ sang the adding machine as I would walk up the stairs to bed. That sound was a kind of a lullaby in our home when I was growing up. Goodnight Dad!

Finally, my favorite image of Dad is on vacation at Old Orchard Beach. Wearing light blue plaid shorts, an old white collared shirt, a floppy “Gilligan” cap, bright red wrist sweatbands, and white athletic socks—the kind with the two stripes at the top—tennis racquet under his arm climbing on his red fat-tire one-speed cruiser bicycle—heading off to play tennis on the clay courts in Ocean Park. That’s the way I’ll remember him.

Goodbye Dad. You can rest well now knowing you did a great job. You left the world a better place than you found it.

We Love you Dad!

Ellen (age 1), Tom (age 3), and Everett (age 39) at our home in White River Junction, Vermont

To make a donation in Everett's honor to the Alzheimer's Association, click here.