I am now the proud owner of a big pile of guns.

As expected, my late father bequeathed his gun collection to me and my brother.  And he owned a lot of guns.  Colts, magnums, shotguns. Also knives and swords.  And one crossbow.

Growing up as a kid, it seemed as though there were weapons everywhere--behind glass cases, hanging on the walls, locked in trunks. It took me a while to realize that this was actually a compromise: if my mother had her way, there wouldn’t have been any artillery within 50 miles of the house.  My father had been respecting her wishes and holding himself back.  Imagine what the house would have been like if he hadn’t been so constrained: instead of getting a car for my 18th birthday, I probably would have been offered a tank and a howitzer.

I mentioned my new possessions to the VP of Sales at my work.  He said, “Are you planning on selling any?” I said, “Probably.  Why, you need guns?” He said, “I won’t be satisfied until I have two guns for each windowsill.”

I never heard Dad use that phrase, but I think he would have liked the sentiment.  For him, carrying weapons constituted a fundamental right, and he was often shocked to find out that people had serious problems with them.

One notable example of this occurred just over a year ago. Dad’s illness had already made it difficult for him to walk long distances, so he was in a wheelchair when we went to Disneyland for my niece’s fifth birthday.  Trying to enter the park, he was stopped by an attendant who pointed at the gift-wrapped box resting on his lap. “You have to open that, sir,” the girl said.

“It’s a gift for my granddaughter,” he said. “I’m not opening it.”

“We have to see what’s inside.”

“Oh all right.” Disgusted, and acting reflexively, Dad reached into his pocket and whipped out a large Paul-Hogan-Style-This-is-a-Knife and started slicing through the wrapping paper.

The girl’s eyes opened wide as she registered the new threat.  Suddenly, this harmless old man carrying a gift for his granddaughter had transformed into a potential terrorist.  “Sir, you--you can’t take that into the park either.”

Naturally, more arguing ensued--to the point that Dad was shouting--but he eventually rolled away, to deposit the knife back in his hotel room.  As he did so, he launched his final, devastating salvo at the hapless park attendant: “I’m writing this up on Yelp!”

Inexplicably, at age 69, my father had become an inveterate Yelp writer with hundreds of reviews to his credit.  In the heat of his fury, he was convinced that a Yelp review detailing his unceremonious treatment would be the Force-guided missile that would detonate and destroy the Disneyland Death Star.

My brother and I will probably take months or longer to go through, catalog, and decide what to do with all the guns. But I was surprised when my brother said, “Why don’t you take the sword that was hanging in the den? I know you want it.”

I had forgotten mentioning it. But I did want it.  It looks old--it’s chipped and battered.  It’s not worth anything.

But that sword hung in the house where I grew up for as long as I can remember.  As a child, I’d be playing video games or reading a book and sometimes I’d just look up and stare at it.  I liked looking at it, running my gaze along its cracks and crevices, seeing how the silver metal was spotted with gray and black imperfections.  I liked how it wasn’t straight but curved, like a half moon.  I liked how it looked as though it had countless stories to tell. There may not be a single item that, in my mind, is more emblematic to me of growing up in that house.

I was glad to take it back to my place, and when I buy a few nails, I will hang it on my own wall.  And I will sometimes stare at it.  It will make me think of Dad, of course.  But it will also tell me the exact same thing that it did when I was a child.  It will tell me: You are home now. You are home.  You are home.

I wrote this post in early 2008, but did not publish it here until now.

My mother wore a shirt this weekend with cartoon depictions of stool from a variety of local forest animals. The headline was “Endangered Feces.” I laughed, not just at the shirt but because it was my mother wearing it; she is not prone to having funny T-shirts.  Unsurprisingly, it was my father who bought it for her.

I was at my parents’ place, in part, to help out with chores.  I started by sweeping the deck. The act of making long, loping strokes with the pushbroom is as familiar to me as my own name.  How many times did I sweep that deck growing up?  Over a thousand? Usually, I wasn’t even paying attention to what I was doing: I would be, say, fourteen years old, simmering with thoughts of sex and high school politics.

My father has shaved his head because he’s expecting his hair to fall out when he starts radiation treatments next week.  His face looks like an egg, but also more like my late grandfather than I ever would have imagined possible.  My brother says it’s a way for our father to keep control: remove the hair before the radiation and the chemo has a chance to do it for him.  I think my brother is right.

My brother showed up unexpectedly with his whole family in tow. He came because we had decided to start filming my father, to try to catch his stories and his life on tape.  We don’t know how long he has left.  It might only be a few months. In any event, he will soon change, as the radiation eats away at his internal organs even as it attempts to destroy his lung cancer.

We were amazed how well the taping went.  Dad had always been quiet, taciturn, uninterested in talking about his past or his feelings.  We had heard dribs and drabs of it over the years, of course.  But today he opened up about everything: his painful childhood, his contentious relationship with his parents, his ambitions.  He seemed to be enjoying it.  He seemed to realize that there was no point in holding anything back.  He was ready to talk.

“Posterity will think he was always that expressive and honest,” my brother joked later. “It will be his last, great misdirection.”

Filming Dad was, in a sense, the second step of a potential new family tradition.  Dad had filmed his own father several years ago, although that was on VHS and the footage has never been transferred to digital or edited. I wondered if all Howards would do this in the future.  My niece might film my brother in fifty years.  We all might step in front of the camera on our way out of this life, a final, formal curtain call.  Digital tape might evolve into holograms; I like to imagine a Hall of Heads where our images sprout up and crackle as we talk, overlapping, about times and people long gone.

We taped for two hours this weekend.  I had heard most of the stories, but some of them surprised me:

“My parents used to give me money on Sunday to take my brother and sister to the movies. It was a double feature with a cartoon, and it cost a quarter. They also gave us a nickel for candy. It took me years later to realize why they did this.  Because one day, we returned home and they were upstairs in their bedroom.  I found a used condom on the floor outside the door. They got us out of the house every Sunday because this was their day to have sex.”

Dad has already started losing weight. When he starts treatments, he will shoot under 150 pounds.  My whole life, he has been overweight--which, as a child, I didn’t register as a negative thing. Rather, he was like a land mass, a continent that I could put my arms around. He was sometimes intimidating, even severe, but always protective and always loving.  I can’t find a way to comprehend that he will shrink down until he weighs less than me. And that means I’m nowhere near to accepting that he will keep on shrinking.  Dwindling.  Growing even smaller until he winks out like a light.

My father died in his sleep on April 12, 2010.  Long before I ever started a blog, as well as during the years that I wrote one, he was always by far my most loyal reader.

My boss had a spare ticket to an Alicia Keys concert and asked if I wanted to go.  It’s not really my kind of music, but hearing artists perform live really changes the game for me. I’d go hear RNC Chairman Michael Steele play the kazoo if it wasn’t too far away.

The opening act was Robin Thicke, whom I never even knew existed but apparently he is Alan Thicke’s son.  Robin is touring with Alicia to promote his new album, Sexual Therapy.  Can you imagine the album titles that he decided not to use?

“Let’s call it Orgasmaeriffic.  No wait, that’s a bit too subtle. How about Sexual Therapy?”

My boss hadn’t thought that Thicke would make it, because apparently his wife gave birth to their first child earlier in the week. But no, Thicke showed up, And he introduced his masterpiece by saying “I wrote this because all women need a little Sexual Therapy sometimes.” Well, perhaps they do. But what about Stay-at-Home-and-Help-the-Wife-with-the-New-Baby Therapy?  Nope, no degree in that.  Seems to me that his wife is likely to need a little actual therapy nine months following the Therapy.

Alicia was fine and definitely gets a pass from me because she sang her song from the last James Bond film--anyone who ever sings a James Bond song is allowed to live, which is why I continue to suffer Madonna to walk the earth--but she kept talking about how hard her struggle was to become a successful performer, and how she was proof that anyone who believes in a dream can achieve it.

Yeah, right, Alicia--have you seen yourself lately? You have cheekbones as high as the Swiss Alps.  Of course you achieved your dreams.  Let’s do a compare and contrast:

ME: I’d like some dreams.

FATE: You’re ugly. Next.

ALICIA: I’d like some dreams.

FATE: Sure!  Have a bunch of Grammys.  And you look hot in that dress.

The moral of the story is: Don’t be a motivational speaker, just shut up and sing. And also, if you’re going to have children with someone who holds a degree in Sexual Therapy, don’t expect a lot of help with late-night feedings.