Interlude

Grandma Dawson

I miss Davey, my late husband. He left this world too early, leaving many of our plans incomplete. We had the good fortune to raise two lovely boys, Rob and John, but we were disappointed when Rob married Carol. Well, ‘disappointed’ might be too strong a term. Rob had been groomed to step into my husband’s shoes, but Carol convinced him to ‘follow his bliss,’ as she called it. In retrospect, it was probably for the best. Carol turned out to be both difficult and loving. She loved my Rob fiercely and staved off both my husband’s and my attempts to put him onto what we considered the right path. What no one could argue with was she made him happy, which was all a mother could really ask for.

Carol finally won us over when she gave birth to our first grandson, Greg. Davey took one look at the baby and told me he would support Rob and Carol in whatever they wanted to do. I was disappointed at first because I saw Rob’s potential. He was someone people felt at ease with, and they would open up to him, whereas Davey’s influence came more from a position of power. Davey wasn’t an imposing figure, but he had something about him that attracted others. His confident approach made people want to trust him. Rob’s approach was more nurturing. It was slower to take root but built more loyalty, if I can be candid. I still think if Rob wanted to, he would be wildly successful in the political realm.

An excellent example of what Rob was capable of was the building of the field house at Lincoln High. Our middle grandson, David, had hatched a plan to copy what he’d seen at Wesleyan Academy. They had lovely facilities. Few people recognize what a herculean effort it had been to get Lincoln’s new facility built in the timeframe in which Rob pulled it off. Typically, something like that would have taken years. And it would have bloated into something unrecognizable when completed.

Rob realized that it had to be done quickly, or our David would never reap the benefits from it. With that in mind, my son helped organize a group of like-minded people to complete the process in record time. Personally, I was astonished that he’d managed it, and was even more astonished that he’d done it almost invisibly. What made me think he might still follow in my husband’s footsteps was that most people had no idea of just how instrumental Rob was in seeing that through. He deftly directed everyone without them realizing he was doing it. That was the sign of a deal-maker, which my Davey was known as.

My younger son, John, was a different story. While he had people skills, he was too much of a skirt-chaser. My first grandson reminded me so much of John. They both cut a broad swath through the high school girl population. While Rob was no saint and went through his share of girls in high school, John was our Casanova. John got that from Davey.

The difference was Davey was much more discreet about his affairs than John ever was. Davey would never embarrass our family or me, and he knew how to keep them secret even years later. John was caught with his pants down a few too many times. In today’s politics, that would be his undoing. He simply has too many skeletons in his closet.

The difference between the boys and my husband was they seemed to take their marriage vows more seriously. When Rob found out he’d fathered Phil, he took it hard. Davey had no such qualms. I put on a brave face for the boys, but his infidelity tore me up inside. My hope was that after seeing how it devastated Carol, my grandsons learned to be faithful.

Professionally, Davey had started out as a local lawyer and earned a reputation for getting things done. If you had a project that hit a snag, you called my Davey. Word soon got out, and he had opportunities to join prestigious law firms in DC, New York, and Chicago. We had several discussions about it but liked living in a small Midwestern community.

We grew up in a town where everyone knew everyone else. Our boys soon learned that if they got up to mischief, word of it would beat them home. On the other side of the coin, you never worried because those same people looked out for each other. You used to hear it said that ‘a man’s word was his bond.’ For many people, that way of thinking was pushed aside in the ‘80s when it became ‘what’s in it for me?’ Davey was the epitome of a man whose word was his bond. With him, you knew if he shook hands on it, you could count on him. Davey was afraid that if we moved to one of those big cities, he would lose sight of his values.

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