Family History - Stories of Grandpa Danny [Part 3]

We always lived far enough away from my father's family that when any of them would come over to visit it was always a special treat. One thing that would almost always happen is we would hear great stories about what it was like to grow up on Bacigalupi Dr., racing down Cardboard Hill, or building makeshift explosives, or sending sisters down hills in home-made go-carts.

The last several times we've been visited I've had the distinct impression to record these stories and to direct the conversation around my grandfather Danny. Grampa Danny passed away when my dad was only 17 so I have never met him and have a strong interest in who he was.

The following is the third part of a transcript of when my Uncle Joe and Aunt Lisa came to visit on September 27th, 2017. You can read the second part by clicking here. (If you would like to listen to the original recording you can do so by clicking here [be warned though that it is not a perfect recording])

Andrew: What about dinner time?

Lisa: We always sat down for dinner. In fact, Steven sat next to me because I chose his name. I voted, I put his name, we all decided on names and I loved the name Steven Patrick, and so my name was the one that we voted on was the best one. So Mom sat where Abbie is, Steven's highchair was right there and I sat right here, 'cause Steven was my baby.

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: 'Cause I was 12 when he was born and he had colic and I'd rock him, and I carried him everywhere with me. he was like my doll. 

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: Yeah he was my baby. So he sat there and one night at dinner we're eating and he throws up like a funnel! Waaaaahhhh! 

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: 'Cause you had, I think, some kind of intestinal issue because you would kick your legs out super hard.

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: Like something like your stomach hurt, and you'd kick and you'd hit me in the stomach and you'd arch your back and cry.

Joe: Sounds like colic.

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: I'm pretty sure you had colic.

Steve: Yeah, I've always been farty and bloated since then.

Lisa: Haha or some sort of intestinal thing...

Steve: No...

Lisa: But I, yeah, Steven sat between Mom and I, and I, you know....

Steve: Dad would sit here, and eventually, somebody sat here, Ricky? Sat here?

Lisa: Valerie?

Steve: Maybe Valerie.

Lisa: Ok, by the front door on Bacigalupi going in, Dad was here, Valerie was here, I was here, Steven in the highchair, Mom, Ricky and Michael?

Steve: Ricky I know sat by the china.

Lisa: OK Ricky and then Mike was there, must have been there.

Steve: Yeah, that's right.

Lisa: And then...

Steve: 'Cause Ricky would refuse, he was the pickiest eater in the family and he would hide food.

Lisa: I remember doing the dishes one night, it was my turn to do the dishes, and I opened up the baked potato and there were all the peas inside the baked potato, and I knew it was from Ricky. And I'm mean, this is me. I called Dad, "Daaaaaaaaaaad!" And Dad came, made Ricky sit at the table with those cold disgusting peas and Ricky was sending me hate looks into the kitchen. And I felt bad. I felt bad that I'd called him out, you know?

Steve: Yeah... he got pretty good at it. I do remember...

Lisa: Hiding food under the table?

Steve: Yes. That was the deal. So we had, it used to be carpet in that family room, they decided to do a little bit of remodeling and replace it with a parquet floor, so they had to move the china cabinet.

Lisa: Right! Right. 

Steve: And Dad moves the china cabinet and underneath the china cabinet was like broccoli from over ten years. Had been like petrified little broccoli. Me and Daniel call it the petrified broccoli forest. It was under there and had been hardened into little broccoli trees where Ricky for years had been putting his broccoli underneath the china cabinet.

Lisa: Yeah.

Candice: How could you not smell it? Like, broccoli smells so bad.

Lisa: I know!

Steve: I don't know! That was the thing!

Lisa: The dogs and the cats peeing, you probably couldn't...

Steve: Yeah, that was probably it. I don't know, but. And we knew exactly who it was. "This is from Ricky!"

Lisa: Ricky was the pickiest pickiest eater. Yeah. He was terrible. But, yeah, I'm trying to remember...disciplining-wise...Dad was, I mean it was the belt but then ... this is the deal. Before we joined the church Dad, you know, working full time and going to school full time, when he came home he would kinda be grouchy. I remember being a little afraid of him 'cause Mom would always say "when your dad gets home you're gonna be in trouble". So Dad was feared because he was kind of the disciplinarian. He'd walk in the door and she'd tell him all the things we did wrong, and then, poor guy! He didn't get to be the nice guy! So I remember being afraid of him. And we moved to Bacigalupi and the cat, he was by the washroom, and the cat did something, and Dad was mad and he kicked the cat into the backyard. He picked up the cat and kicked the cat, he was mad. And I remember being afraid and was just like, my gosh, he just kicked the cat! You know, he was really mad. But when we joined the church he changed. He didn't do things out of anger anymore, and I remember it was a definite change. He tried to be a better person, more patient person, his shift, he shifted, and it was a really good shift. And I remember visibly noticing that he changed. You know? To a better person. And not that he was bad, but he just didn't have the Light of Christ, you know? It makes a difference.

Steve: Yeah.

Joe: I only knew your dad for eight years, a little over eight years. And never once did I ever see him do anything out of anger.

Lisa: Yes.

Joe: You could tell when he was upset, but he was always very deliberate.

Steve: Mmm Hmm.

Joe: Um, that's when you knew you were in trouble. When I noticed is when he goes, "you understand why that was wrong?"

Steve: Right! Exactly!

Lisa: Oh and here's Joe, his son in law!

Joe: Oh he never did that to me. But holy cow! No, but I remember when I went and met all your friends when we were engaged and everyone, "Have you met Danny yet?" "Have you met Danny yet?" "No, I haven't." And he goes, "You gotta meet Danny." Scary dude!

Lisa: 'Cause Dad was in Washington DC when we were dating and got engaged.

Joe: Scary dude!

Lisa: And he hadn't really met Dad. They all were afraid, all my friends were afraid of Dad.

Joe: Oh yeah. Oh, this is clear.

Lisa: 'Cause they never saw him just being goofy. And then Bill McDonald went water skiing with us at Clear Lake and saw Dad with the hat on, and whooping and hollerin', he said, "this isn't the same person!" I'm like, "he's like this with us when we have the family." But he saw him at church and he was more serious, you know, he didn't seem as fun. But he got to see it. But yeah.

Joe: All your friends really respected him, you could tell that. When they said "Wait till you meet Danny" and "Wait till you shake his hand."

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: When, Dad always said he could tell the character of a person, of a man, by his handshake. So I told Joe, "You're gonna meet my Dad, he's gonna shake your hand and he's gonna be testing your character by your handshake." So no joke, we walk into Bacigalupi, Joe walks in, in the kitchen, "Dad this is Joe, Joe this is Dad" and they go Wwwwoooooooaaaaaaa!!!!! It was just, neither one of them was, I mean, it was so funny!

Andrew: A power tornado in the kitchen?!

Lisa: Two alpha males, just....

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: But it was so funny, I was like "ohhh!"

Steve: Dad loved Joe though!

Joe: Oh yeah, I loved your Dad.

Andrew: From the beginning though?

*Silence for a while*

Lisa: No....

*Laughter*

Joe: Now wait a second!

Steve: Joe is, you have to tell them what you were like when you first met.

Candice: Well how long have you guys been married?

Lisa: 38 years.

Joe: 38 years...

Steve: But tell them what you were like when you, when you got married. I mean when you met Dad.

Joe: What I was like?

Lisa: Laughing

Joe: Oh I thought I was a pretty bad dude. Uh, I was big... 

Steve: I thought you were a pretty bad dude. I mean, you were nice....

Joe: But I'd been warned so much about your dad there was no way I was gonna let him get the best of me. You know?

Lisa: Yeah.

Joe: I don't know. I had a lot of growing up to do.

Steve: Joe was a bodybuilder, he's not telling you that.

Lisa: He was huge.

Adam: I've seen it. I've seen the picture. There's one on Dad's facebook with Dad in his jeans up to his nipples, and a really colorful rainbow coat, and you're carrying an entire Christmas tree on one arm.

Steve: Yeah that's right!

*Laughter*

Steve: And Dad knew that! Dad, yeah, so there was definitely - and Lisa won't tell you, but Dad... Lisa is like Dad's ultimate favorite like by an order of magnitude in the family.

Lisa: Me?!

Steve: Yes!

Joe: Oh he loved you! Oh my gosh.

Steve: Absolutely.

Lisa: No way!

Steve: Absolutely.

Lisa: You! It was you!

Steve: Everybody knew!

Lisa: You were Dad's favorite!

Steve: No. He'd call us "the boys" but...

Lisa: Steven Patrick, you were his favorite.

Steve: No...

Joe: No... you had a special place in his heart....

Steve: Yes.

Lisa: Dad and I were very similar, and I understood how he thought, and I think very similar. We had a similar, and I think you're like that.

Steve: Yeah. But when you were gonna get married that was a big freakin' deal.

Joe: Yeah.

Lisa: Well, yeah. And Joe had just been active in the church for what?

Joe: I had just gotten, maybe ten months?

Lisa: Yeah. Had not served a mission. His parents, his dad smoked. you know? And Dad has these huge aspirations for me, um, I'm at BYU, I'm gonna return a returned missionary, you know, all this kind of stuff. And all of the sudden I'm coming home with this guy who has just gotten active in church, parents aren't active, you know. And he didn't ask permission to marry me.

Joe: Now, I was ... I was overly cocky...

Lisa: He was cocky.

Joe: I mean, I didn't care if he said yes or no. I was...

Steve: You're marrying Lisa.

Joe: I was marrying Lisa and no one was going to stop me. Well, SHE could have stopped me, but that was about it.

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: Yeah, so that was...

Joe: I regret that now, but uh... yeah. Your dad and I got along really really well.

Steve: Yeah, yeah exactly.

Lisa: In fact, we had Thanksgiving at our house a few weeks before Dad died. And he was in our room, but it always felt like he was disappointed in my choice. I always felt like that.

Joe: With me?

Lisa: Yes! I just kinda, he just... he never told me he... 'cause he wrote me letters, he used to write me every week when I was in college. And he was like, "Lisa Rae you need to be, I'm not thinking that you're making good decisions, you know, have you thought this through?" You know, questioning my decision. And um, I always kind of thought that he was disappointed in me.

Joe: Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh.

*Adam brings out the Christmas tree photo*

Lisa: What is that? The Christmas tree?

Steve: Yes! Exactly! The easiest way to describe joe was "Macho".

Joe: I was so big.

Lisa: Yeah, that was Michael.

Steve: And my dad prided himself on being athletic and a man's man as well. So there were two man's.... and my brothers were not like that. None of us were like Heman.

Lisa: No!

Andrew: None of your sons were either. We were lanky and...

Steve: Right.

Andrew: Fairly athletic, but I wouldn't say, like we weren't manly men, or whatever.

Steve: And Joe was a man's man. You hunted, you shot guns. 

Lisa: Yeah.

Steve: He, uh. Yeah he was athletic and that just was not the case with any of us, so it was perfect.

Lisa. Yeah.

Joe: Well this is news to me.

Steve: No keep going!

Lisa: It was Dad...

Joe: I knew that he was disappointed in some of the decisions that you had made when we were engaged. When we went off to Las Vegas.

Lisa: Right, we went to Las Vegas.

Joe: Probably that, I'd have to guess. And I can look back on that now and I'd say yeah, that was probably a bad idea...

Lisa: I would, we get it. But I was in Utah, he was in California, and he wanted to give me the ring so we met in Las Vegas.

Candice: Make's sense.

Lisa: You know, half way!

Joe: Thank you! Thank you!

Lisa: Well Dad was in Washington DC and he found out we'd...

Steve: Right.

Lisa: And there weren't cell phones then. He found out we'd been in Las Vegas and he thought, you know, that we were going to elope, or, bad, bad choice. And it was a bad choice. But we were good. We were good, we behaved ourselves, and I went back, you know, to school and he went back to California. And um, yeah. So I, two weeks, he was at our house and he was... we had Dad sleeping in our room. And I went in and lay down next to him 'cause he wasn't feeling good. And I just said, "I just need to know," I said, "are you happy with my decision to marry Joe?" and he just squeezed my hand really tight and was like, you know. And I just needed to know that because to have him disappointed in you, that was the worst thing ever.

Steve: Yes. Yeah.

Lisa: I never wanted him to be disappointed in me. And yeah, I just kinda felt like he was not disappointed with, he was disappointed in some of my progress up to then, you know?

Steve: Yeah.

Lisa: When we met, he just, I was growing up, I was making my own choices, and I was the oldest, or second oldest....

Joe: I remember, I remember when we told him I was going to quit my job and I was gonna go back to school. Your dad was so happy. 

Steve: Yes.

Lisa: He's so supportive.

Joe: Your dad was, getting an education, that was.

Lisa: I was so grateful. Yeah. What did your dad say?

Joe: I couldn't say those words. Exactly what he said. But he thought it was a stupid idea. And uh, you know, I went to work, I worked high, you know I had a suit and people thought I was a doctor and lots of good stuff.

Steve: Yeah.

Joe: And he went "Why in the ____ would you do that?" and I said "Dad, you know? Too many limitations. I have higher aspirations." It was the best thing I ever did.

Steve: Had Michael been born by then?

Lisa: Michael was six months old when Joe quit his job and started college.

Steve: Yeah, Dad, that was a big-time story for, by the way, that Dad told us when I was growing up. Yeah, big time. He was so proud.

Joe: And that's what of the things I tell my Deacons, you know, about education. I say that the best decision, well, the second best decision I ever made in my life. The first decision was marrying Lisa.

Everyone in the room: AAAAWWWWWEEEE!

Lisa: We love each other!

Joe: Second one is getting my education and going on. You know, I have a good job that paid decently. I said I went and got an education and got a much much better job, and I got to travel all over the world.

Steve: Right!

Joe: I said, you know...

Lisa: Dad was so supportive, and I love this about him too. Um, after we joined the church there was some fireside about doing a priesthood interview with your children. And so he'd take me into the living room...

Steve: Yup.

Lisa: And he had this spiral little notebook that he'd write important things down on.

Joe: He always had that notebook!

Steve: Yes.

Lisa: And he had a mechanical pencil. And so I'm sitting there in the living room and I remember kinda like it's just us one on one, I was like, is it gonna be a lecture, what is this? And he said "What are some things our family can do to improve?" and I thought, oh he wants my opinion! And I said "Michael" my brother Michael, "Is mean! And he says mean things to me!" and Dad says "oh". And I said, "and I complain about it and nobody ever does anything about it! And I wish someone would tell him to stop doing that!" 'Cause he always called me the Zeplin Blimp and Aunt Jemima and you know, that stuff ... it was mean! It was mean! So I said, the boys need to talk nicer to the girls. And he wrote it down. And I was just like, what I'm saying is important! And then he'd always say "what are your plans for your education? What do you want to do?" And that was, most girls in my generation, you were gonna get married. It didn't matter about you getting an education. But education was big! And so Dad, so tell me what you're going to do for your education, the same as he did for the boys. Which for a lot of my friends that was not equal. But he was like your education is just as important as your brothers. Man, I was so grateful for that.

-TO BE CONTINUED-