Lessons in life, parenting and baseball

Larry, the hurler

     Several times over the past month I've sat down with the intention of writing an article about my father Larry Hollst. Each time I've begun writing I opened with a different relevant subject from his life. And and each time I've written about a thousand words and then deleted them. Finding the precise words was tougher than I anticipated and if you knew my dad, then you'd know nothing but preciseness would be acceptable. 

     When he passed away on June 7, 2002 it was unexpected. He and my mom were planning a trip out west and I went over to pick him up so he could go get a rental car. It was about 7:10 A.M. when I arrived and about ten minutes earlier my mom, who was a lunch lady at Beavercreek High School, had left for her last day of work for the school year. Sometime between her leaving and me arriving he collapsed and died. I found him in the family room facedown in his pajamas.

Dad and Grandma Hollst at Northwestern

     My dad and I had a typical father-son relationship; sometimes full of laughter and joy and other times full of arguments and periods of silence. He was a tough act to follow, to be sure. He was a standout athlete in high school who passed up on a tryout with the Cincinnati Reds in favor of attending Northwestern University. He was also a golfer, bowler and basketball star in high school. I, on the other hand, was both a mediocre athlete and scholar. He transferred from Northwestern after a few years and finished his degree in business and marketing at LaSalle Extension University in Chicago and then finally the University of Dayton. He also enlisted in the Army Reserves and served for a number of years as a Staff Sargent, stationed mainly at Fort Meade, Maryland working in "Military Unintelligence," as he laughingly called it. I wasn't cut out for the military, he told me more than once. And I don't think he was referring to my flat feet. I also failed out of Lincoln Memorial University in Harrogate, TN and wound up getting my associates degree at a broadcasting school. Not that there's anything wrong with this route but let's just say my diploma isn't printed on parchment or hanging in a fancy frame like his.
     At times he was very critical of my career choice in broadcasting and said so when I was fired from a few radio jobs. He came from a background where "work" was in fact, work. Though it could be a tough racket, to him radio didn't seem much like work. He was successful businessman who worked in the early days of the computer industry at both NCR and then Univac. He sold both the University of Dayton and Hobart Brothers in Troy, their first mainframe computer system back in the early 1970's. At times I know he bragged about me being in radio but he didn't hold his tongue when things blew-up on me. He also wasn't thrilled with how I struggled mightily early on as a single custodial parent. Again, he had no experience with such things and once told my mom he thought I'd fail and they'd end up raising my son. That didn't happen but I certainly couldn't have done it without the help of my family. Shortly before he passed he and my mom separated. I won't go into the gory details but suffice to say I wasn't happy with him. There was silence. A very long period of silence. Thankfully before he passed we managed to work out some of our issues. After he died, therapy and my wife Mary helped me reconcile the rest. 

Dad at Fort Meade

     Instances and circumstances like these throughout my life had a profound affect on how I viewed our relationship. To me, he wasn't a very emotionally available person. We were friendly and got along and enjoyed each other's company but there was a gap in the level of father/son intimacy. I know this intimacy can exist because I feel it with my own son. Sometimes I think I tell him "I love you" too much or worry about his feelings being hurt by my parental criticisms. I can count the number of times my dad told me loved me on one hand and I vowed to never make son question my love for him. As an adopted child I needed to feel this connection. Adoptees are in the unique position of knowing (hopefully) their adoptive parents chose them and made up their minds to love them. That's a beautiful thing to know but if a young child senses distance from one his or her adoptive parents, it's very easy to internalize the notion that one parent loves them less. It was during my early teens I began recognizing some of the many differences between our personalities and abilities and began blaming myself for not being good enough. My struggles in school and not achieving what I had hoped for athletically added to my feelings of inadequacy.

Me and dad at Stone Mountain in Georgia

   Rest assured though, maturity and therapy helped me realize his inability to emote had nothing to do with me. I know my dad loved me and was proud of me. It just wasn't his style to shower down affection and "atta boys" very often. I also know, through almost 46 years of self-analyzation, I was one child who needed craved attention. I'm sure certain some of it spilled over into my adulthood, as well. I'm guessing it's all part of my desire to be loved and accepted and maybe on some deep intrinsic level it has to do with being adopted. So basically the dynamic was, you had a dad, who was raised during an era when men were told not to show their tender side or share their emotions openly, raising a son who felt deeply, craved attention, and needed to express his emotions accordingly. Obviously we were two very different people and clearly there were going to challenges from the very beginning. Again, I look to my relationship with my own son for verification of this notion. He too feels deeply and I know we relate on a level which was foreign to me and my dad.

Dad being wonderfully ridiculous

     All of that being said...my dad was a great guy who was patient beyond belief. He was a great playmate and taught me the game of baseball inside and out. My greatest childhood memories involve him and me playing baseball, watching baseball, talking baseball, and going to the coin shop to buy baseball cards. He was also a wonderful provider who gave both of his children a good start in life and supported us in anyway we needed. He enjoyed finding the perfect Christmas or birthday gift and threw the best birthday parties for his children. He never told me how to think about politics, religion or anything of that nature and allowed me to make mistakes and recover on my own (or at least try to recover on my own before lending a helping hand.) He was a wonderful grandfather who loved playing trains with his grandson Alex, who today still has memories of grandpa. He came to my soccer games and even drove 300 miles round trip one day so he could watch me start my first game in college. He relished embarrassing me in front of my friends but in a loving way. At my first wedding he played a cassette tape of me singing "She's Like the Wind" by Patrick Swayze; at times he was wonderfully ridiculous. He stuck up for me and stood by me and somehow knew exactly which was needed at the time. I wish he'd been alive to meet my wife Mary. He would've loved her for who she is as a person and loved her even more for loving me. And I wish, more than anything, he was here for my mom. 

Alex and dad playing hoops

     He was a great man, a great dad and a great grandpa. And when Mary and I have children of our own I look forward to telling them about their Grandpa Hollst. One of the last things we did together was go on a road trip to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. It was a memorable trip and we spent a lot of time talking as we drove the many miles to Cooperstown, NY. We went in June of 2001 during a rare break from my Dayton Dragons schedule as the Director of Entertainment during the Inaugural Season. He never said so, but I think he was proud of the fact a Hollst was finally drawing a paycheck from a professional baseball club. Even if, instead of hitting home runs or catching a full 9 innings, I was overseeing the launching of hot dogs and t-shirts. He went to several games that season and I know it made him smile. It made me smile.