Off the Black is a movie starring Nick Nolte. I know you know that I went to grade school here in Ames with Nick. I am also sure that he doesn't remember me from "Adam's off Ox. (Where did that phrase come from?) The movie is described as :An aging, disillusioned alcoholic (Nolte) gets a younger friend (Morgan) and wants him to pose as his son at a school reunion. It was released in December and I am sure it never played in Ames because I would have gone to see it.
Nick is a consummate actor. He is absolutely incredible and I am amazed at the quality of performance which he gives. He had a lot of trouble a few years back and people were making fun of him in the media and I have to admit that he looked pretty awful in the picture. Be that as it may he has seemingly straightened himself out and is back on top as an actor. When he cleans up during this film and when you see the picture of him as a young person you can see just how handsome he is.
The film is about relationships between fathers and sons and Nick has a son who won't have anything to do with him so he makes video tapes and tells his son what is happening in his life. He sends the tapes off and they get returned unopened except once in awhile they don't come back so he keeps on making them.
Nick plays an umpire and after one game his car and house get vandalized. He graps one of the kids and forces him to work for him to clean up the damage. The boy played by Trevor Morgan who will develop as a good actor (Heck he is a good actor already) plays a character who was abandoned by his mother and lives with his father and sister. Their relationship is rough also.
It is a terrific movie and I recommend you rent it and watch it.
But it got me to thinking about fathers. I was fortunate in my mother. Not so much in my father. My parents were divorced when I was about 4 years old. I have one memory of Al Simser when I was a kid. He came out to the station where my mother and I lived with my grandparents. He was driving a convertible. (Perhaps that is why I love them) and took me for a ride. At that point in time I was calling my grandfather "Dad" (probably because that is what my mother called him) - Anyway I did not see him again until I was in college.
A girl I was dating had looked up her birth mother and had a relationship with her, She encouraged me to do the same. The only contact I had with him was that I had sent him an invitation to my High School graduation and I got a card back saying I was welcome to come down at any time.
So I made the contact and went down and looked him up. He was married to the woman he had been dating while still married to my mother. I liked her. He was OK. Not much of interest there, nor did we have anything much in common. I was in contact for awhile but when he left Doris to marry someone from Atlantic and then tried to pick up my cousin's wife in a bar I decided there was no future in trying to establish any kind of a relationship.
After he died his wife asked me to come down to visit his grave. He is buried in Atlantic. I told her that since he had chosen not to have a relationship with me in life I would not have one with him in death.
Instead I had "father figures" in my life and they were great. My grandfather - "Doc" Cole, My uncles Dave Peterson, Harold Dawson, Max Beaman and Carl Bates. My aunt and uncle's friend Gene Wierson who ran a TV repair shop and let me tag along with him on calls all showed me what it was like to be a man and they were the finest examples I could ever have hoped for. My sister's father was pretty good most of the time also but he had one major problem which he never overcame.
Anyway as Father's day approaches those of you who have fathers be grateful for them. I know that my friend Maryjane reads this blog and I sure include her father Joe Shannon into my pantheon of fatherhood examples.
There are a lot of men out there like my (biological) father who abandon their children. I just hope that those kids are as lucky as I was to have someone in their life to show them the kind of love I was shown by these great men.
Thanks Nick, for making a great/terrific/wonderful movie that got me thinking about all of this. I am grateful. Stay warm and Be Happy. Hugs. j
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