Father’s Day hits a bit differently for those of us whose fathers have sadly passed on. My dad, Al Friend, passed away in 2018—which has somehow been six years ago already.
I think about him often, and even more so on holidays or on his birthday, of course. I find myself reflecting most on simple moments from my childhood, and am sometimes surprised at how my memories of those moments have changed through the lens of adulthood.
I think of those countless evenings in the 1980s when I was growing up at Steward Manor Apartments. My friends and I would spend every waning moment of daylight at the basketball court behind Morris Drive. None of us wore watches or had any inclination of what the actual time was—we were just supposed to get home before dark. Darkness, of course, is subjective; and let’s face it—it never really got dark at the basketball court, what with all those lamp posts and all. If I hadn’t gone home by the time those lights came on, my dad would soon appear around that corner, shouting, “Richie! Time to go!” It was never an angry shout—just a non-negotiable request that I stop playing and head home with him right at that moment.
In hindsight, it was probably something he’d experienced with his own father growing up in rural Swanton, Maryland in the 1950s, and something that countless kids experience regardless of where they grew up or which generation they’re from. Admittedly, at the time, seeing him come around that corner was never a welcome sight for me. I always wanted to stay out longer. And I remember often wondering, enviously, how much longer my friends got to stay out after I’d left.
While I was aware of the other kids’ situations at home, (most of them were living in single-parent households with only their moms) I never really dwelled on it while we were growing up. But I do think about that more as an adult, especially when those friends comment on it while reminiscing about our youth. Nearly every one of my closest childhood friends—friends I’m incredibly blessed to still be in touch with today—frequently recall the memory of my dad walking down to the basketball court to tell me it was time to go home. But they had a much different perspective than I did. “You have no idea how jealous we were,” one of them told me, “that you had a dad who cared enough to do that.” As a child, it had never occurred to me that something that had seemed almost like a punishment to me had been viewed so differently by everyone else. And it was powerful to hear and realize that.
My dad worked as a counter sales clerk at an electrical supply warehouse on Okie Street, NE in the Ivy City neighborhood of Washington, DC. It was—and still is—a very industrial part of town, but it’s a lot more gentrified than it was in those days. As a young boy, I remember worrying when he was a few minutes late coming home. The heavy traffic along New York Avenue and the B/W Parkway didn’t play into my thinking; my mind always went to the worse case scenarios. I’d heard the stories he’d told my mom about things that had happened there—like the time his coworker, Kenny Proctor, was robbed at the BP gas station just up the street. After taking his wallet, the man shot Kenny in the face. He survived, thankfully, but I remember begging my dad to make sure he only stopped at gas stations in Laurel from that point on.
The warehouse where he’d worked made a distinct impression on me as a youngster. I’d gone with him once on a “Take Your Kid to Work Day” assignment when I was in first or second grade, and I can still picture that entire place vividly in my mind—the long sales counter in front, the old warehouse loft in back... I even remember the unrepeatable dirty limerick I spotted on one of the bathroom walls that day.
Not long afterwards, another school project entailed drawing a picture of where you wanted to work when you grew up. Some kids drew doctors’ offices, the space shuttle, and at least one drew the White House. Figuring I’d work there myself when I was old enough, I drew that warehouse. When my teacher saw it, a look of concern came over her face. She probably thought the dusty, cobwebbed nook full of cardboard boxes—dimly-lit by a single bare lightbulb—was something out of a crime scene. “Richard... What is this place, exactly?” she asked. When I explained, she offered the very first piece of career advice I ever received. “Well, you draw very well. I’m thinking maybe you ought to go into something more... artistic in nature.” (I’m a graphic designer today, so she was right).
Not long after I’d started writing my Lost Laurel blog in 2012, I received a note from a reader who recognized my name. More specifically, he remembered my dad. He explained that he’d worked with my dad in DC in the early 1980s, and since he lived in Maryland City at the time, he and my dad would frequently carpool together. He shared a memory of the dreaded inventory they had to do every year—it was long, difficult work, but it paid substantial overtime. “I remember your dad said he was going to buy you a video game with the extra money he made that year.” That explains how my parents were able to buy my Atari 2600, which, at $200 in the early 1980s, was the equivalent of about $450 in today’s dollars. It was a lot of money for their modest single income, and I’d never known that it was my dad’s idea. I’m so grateful that I got to relay that story to him years before he passed, and to let him know how much it meant to me.
The company he’d worked for changed hands in the mid-1980s from DHE Electric to Eck Supply, Co., and by the end of the decade they’d started laying people off—including my dad. That turned out to be fortuitous, though, when he ended up taking a job at Dominion Electric, right here in Laurel on Cherry Lane. After decades of long commutes in gridlock traffic, he could finally get to and from work in a matter of minutes.
The old warehouse building in DC is now home to an award-winning craft distillary, and there’s something uniquely special about enjoying a glass of their bourbon every now and then, knowing that it was made right there where my dad once worked. It’s almost like having a drink with him, one more time. And it’s a reminder that if you’re lucky enough to still have parents in your life, cherish those moments. All of them.
Richard Friend is a founding member of The Laurel History Boys, and creator of LostLaurel.com.