The Mandelbear's Musings

River: Dad... 22

Fri, 05 Feb 2021 18:56:11 GMT

My father died 22 years ago today, about a year after he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. That was only three weeks after my mother-in-law's death from a stroke on January 20th. Not a good way to start the year.

Dad introduced me to folk music, computers, and science fiction; I started out reading his books on computer design, Communications of the ACM (among others), Science, American Scientist, and the copies of Galaxy and Astounding (later, Analog) that he borrowed from a coworker. We disagreed on the relative merits of OS-2 and Linux, but very little else.

I guess after 22 years there isn't a whole lot more to be said.

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River: Dad -- 21

Wed, 05 Feb 2020 19:22:47 GMT

My father died 21 years ago today. I don't know what's appropriate for a loss that's old enough to drink. Maybe I'll have a glass of gin tonight.

I wrote two songs: The Stuff that Dreams are Made Of and Rainbow's Edge; I wrote about them, along with my other memorial songs, last November in this "Songs for Saturday" post -- go there or follow the song links for lyrics and audio.

I'm... okay, I guess. You get used to it, after a while.

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River: Dad... 20

Tue, 05 Feb 2019 18:30:35 GMT

It's been twenty years to the day since my father died. (And twenty years plus two weeks since my mother-in-law died; that was a devastating couple of weeks.)

Since it's FAWM, I probably ought to try to write a song. But there are two already: "The Stuff that Dreams are Made Of" and "Rainbow's Edge". Both have pretty extensive notes; I'm not going to duplicate them here.

I'm okay; it's been long enough that most of the sharp edges have worn off. (Although, I almost posted this with 10 instead of 20 -- maybe it hasn't been that long.)

The Stuff that Dreams are Made Of: [ogg] [mp3]

I still find myself wanting to call and tell him something, from time to time.

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River: Abraham Savitzky (May 29, 1919 - Feb. 5, 1999)

Mon, 05 Feb 2018 20:41:51 GMT

It's been 19 years since my father died. He introduced me to science fiction, computers, digital filtering, electronics, and folk music, among other things. His paper on digital filtering of spectra is one of the most-cited papers in in the journal Analytical Chemistry.

Dad was as much a packrat as I am, so there was always a good supply of reading material around the house: magazines including CACM, Science, Analog (and its predecessor, Astounding), Galaxy, American Scientist, and others; plus a small collection of computer design and SF books (including a few by his grad-school classmate Isaac Asimov).

He was also the gentlest person I've ever met.

Links:: Abraham Savitzky - Wikipedia; Savitzky–Golay filter - Wikipedia; Smoothing and Differentiation of Data by Simplified Least Squares Procedures. - Analytical Chemistry (ACS Publications); The Stuff that Dreams are Made Of; Rainbow's Edge

I guess I'm not up to saying anything more today. He died of pancreatic cancer in 1999, a little over two weeks after Colleen's mother died of breast cancer. It's a rough couple of weeks, and I never really know why until I remember.

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Fathers' Day, 2016

Sun, 19 Jun 2016 23:32:21 GMT

Unless the sound of silent thoughts carries up the Rainbow Bridge, I won't be saying "Happy Fathers' Day" to my Dad. He died a little over 17 years ago. He got me interested in computers, over 50 years ago -- I miss him every time I think "I'd love to call Dad and tell him about..."

Science fiction, and folk music -- he would have loved the filk community. He took me to trade shows and conventions back before they stopped allowing kids in; he would have enjoyed a filk convention. He would have loved my CD, Coffee, Computers, and Song!

Songs for Sunday:

The Stuff that Dreams are Made Of -- I wrote this a couple of months before Dad died, and sang it for him on my last visit.
Rainbow's Edge -- Mom had asked me to write a song to sing at Dad's memorial. I don't sing this one all that often.
The World Inside the Crystal -- Dad was a programmer (when he wasn't being a chemist). I don't think he ever said so, but I'm pretty sure this was his favorite.

Not exactly the playlist I'd planned, but...

ETA: as I hoist my glass of gin I'm reminded of the way Dad made Tanqueray martinis: straight gin -- there's a bottle of vermouth somewhere in the house. For a slightly sweeter version, open the bottle.

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Veterans' Day

Mon, 11 Nov 2013 16:16:09 GMT

Dad never talked about his experiences in WWII. I found out from his obituary that he had run radar operations in England.

(eta) Thanks, Dad

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