Monday, August 23, 2004

Aloha, Dad Peare (1918 - 2004)

Dear Readers,

Sorry for the lack of posts recently. I've been away from the blog for the past two weeks, attending to my dad, who passed away on August 13. I took my ukulele with me back to Detroit and spent a lot of nice, reflective time playing and singing to Dad at the hospital. At the end he was very tired and slept most of the time, but he seemed to like the music, and it seemed only right to sing him to sleep with songs from his glory days.

The last song I sang for him was "I'll See You in My Dreams", which I chose not because of the George Harrison memorial connection, but because Dad's cousin was married to Saxie Mansfield, a tenor sax player who played with the song's composer, bandleader Isham Jones. I remember Dad recalling how several times when he was a kid, he woke up and went downstairs to find the Isham Jones Orchestra crashed in his parents' living room. Imagine having to step over Woody Herman to get to the kitchen!

So, farewell, Dad. I'll see you in my dreams...

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