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xiii introduction When I think back to my favorite childhood memory of my father, the same one always presents itself—a rare, unguarded moment that occurred one summer afternoon in my eighth year when I inspired the stern, unforgiving old Swede to guffaw in amusement. The moment was spontaneous and joyful. I had never seen my father like that before; he was not the kind of man who freely displayed his emotions. And I never again heard him laugh as happily and fully as he did on that humid Saturday afternoon we shared in his backyard. With the remains of an unfiltered Pall Mall wedged firmly between two fingers of his left hand, he clutched the garden hose like a six-shooter with his right, then suddenly turned and pointed the hose in my direction. I gasped in surprise as a geyser of icy water rained down on my back and shoulders. I darted back and forth, first in real, then feigned dismay, sensing that the moment I stopped running and squealing, his laughter would also fade. He was sixty-four, set in his ways, and not prone to engaging in humor of any sort; I was only a little boy and very much afraid of this strange old man, the father I barely knew. Finally exhausted, I collapsed onto the wet grass breathing heavily. Pausing for a moment, my father solemnly looked down at me. I returned his stare and, for a fraction of a second, expected him to reach down and embrace me. He only turned off the hose. With his sudden change in demeanor, I understood that our game was over. “Go in and dry yourself off, sonny boy,” he said without the slightest residue of humor. “Otherwise, your mother will accuse me of causing you to get pneumonia.” xiv introduction My father then turned his back and went back to tending his cherished roses and hibiscuses, living things that did not talk back to him or demand favors or immediate payment of overdue alimony or child support. The only other times I observed my father exhibiting such irreverence and animation were in the company of his draftsmen and architects in the air-conditioned comfort of a cocktail lounge or elbow to elbow with workingmen in the saloons lining Clark Street in Chicago’s last “Swedetown.” As the immigrant laborers of my father’s generation spoke grimly and with equal contempt both of the hard times they left in Sweden and of the unemployment lines awaiting them in America during the Depression, socialism and social drinking mingled. My father usually presided over these discussions, basking in the rapt attention and respect accorded him by his peers for his understanding and insight in such matters. When he wasn’t showing off his knowledge or caught up in the drama of debate, however, he was moody and prone to incessant introspection. My dad was a contractor, a master builder, employing many of those Swedish tradesmen. Together they lent their expertise and sturdy hands to the great city-to-suburb migration that transformed the rural areas surrounding the city into the segregated bedroom communities in the prosperous years following World War II. At various times, his peers called my father a craftsman, a socialist, an anarchist, and a serious imbiber who was never drunk—at least not by their standards. A collection of ex-wives and jilted fiancées called him much worse. I have looked back upon that afternoon in the backyard, replaying that tiny fragment of my childhood over and over, asking why moments like those cannot become eternities; why the differences between an elderly immigrant father and his American-born son could never be resolved. Who was this man who inspired in others such levels of fear as well as respect, contempt as well as attraction? For most of my life, I have struggled to understand and come to terms with my father’s ever-present “Swedishness,” his “old country” life and values, and to comprehend how these influences affected our relationship. I realize now how deeply the tentacles of that culture, which reflected a time of extreme hardship and travail, extended into his American life. My mother’s family hailed from Sweden, too. But her Swedish heritage and her family’s American journey were far different from my father’s. My mother’s father—my grandfather Richard Stone—arrived in America in 1904. He was married and his children were born into the...

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