‘Nickel’ Starts with ‘K,’ and Other (Well-Meaning) Lies My Father Told Me

T he Tooth Fairy has a bad track-record in our home. Once, she didn’t come for three days after my brother lost a molar. When questioned, my dad said it was because he’d forgotten to put up the Tooth Fairy radar. Who knew the Tooth Fairy was so technologically advanced? Our tardy tooth collector has an excuse for every occasion, as evidenced by the time my sister received a note under her pillow alongside the long-delayed quarters. The contents? According to the Tooth Fairy, a massive fight had broken out at the local school, and she was so snowed under with teeth, she had to delay her visit to our home. Twenty-twenty was also a rough year for the Tooth Fairy, and she demanded hazard pay, apparently. Oh, and over the years, she was frequently delayed by bad weather.

Or so my dad told us.

Did you know that pickles make hair grow on your nose? Actually, most food apparently does this. We’re still not sure why that was supposed to incentivize us to eat said food, but then again, kids are funny like that. Oh, and be sure to wash behind your ears. If not, moss will grow there.

Or so my dad told us.

When you’re with Dad, you never know what color your food will be. Green eggs and ham may be on the menu one day. Cinnamon may coat your chicken the next. The kicker was always St. Patrick’s Day morning, though, when your milk would turn green if you said, “St. Patrick, pray for us.”

Or so my dad told us.

Many of us have amusing stories of nonsensical quips from our parents, whose quirks and quotes often follow us through life. A grandmother recently told me that, because of a well-intended lecture on goodness she gave to her granddaughter, that little girl now thinks horns will grow on her head whenever she’s bad. Slightly less frightening, but no less entertaining, is the story some are told that brown cows give chocolate milk. These, and many other wildly implausible tales, make up our childhood memories, giving us occasion to smile and chuckle a bit at their remembrance.

What really takes the cake in our home, though, is the spelling. To this day, some of my siblings are still salty because Dad would pronounce “nickel” as “knickel” (no, the “k” is not silent), and say his children had gotten the word wrong on spelling tests. Our unrepentant father has not ceased in this corruption of minds and the English language, and the spelling tests of his future grandkids will probably reflect it.

Charming as these harmless lies are, however, it was (and is) the truths spoken by my father that most deeply resonated with me. Some truths he broke to us were hard: the news of a miscarriage in the family, a tragic death in our community, the awareness of a vice one needed to correct. These truths take time, skill, and patience to convey, but their being spoken was a necessary part of family growth in charity and communication.

What would fatherhood be without humor? We’ve all heard dad jokes and spent more time rolling our eyes at bad puns than we care to count. But this is another truth my dad taught me: A little humor goes a long way. Through word and deed, he has expressed this to us, as we watch him laugh with my mom and lovingly tease all of us kids. Every moment, every occasion has a song, joke, or misused idiom, and these dashes of humor at the right moment can transform our perspectives and lighten our hearts.

The most fundamental truth instilled in me by my dad, though, is that of faith. Not only did he proclaim this truth to us as we grew up, he still lives it daily. This is the bedrock, the foundation upon which he builds his life, and his joy because of it continues to inspire us.

My dad recently lost his own father to Alzheimer’s, and with that loss came the realization that his generation is the next to go. This is a startling thought for both parents and children, but one that, with characteristic truthfulness, Dad has approached unhesitatingly. While we didn’t know our grandfather well, we’ve been moved by the stories told about him by my dad, and the honest but loving way he describes the man who raised him. Furthermore, my father’s selfless giving of his time and his endurance of many a sleepless night in my grandfather’s final days gave me one of the greatest witnesses to truth that I’ve experienced.

Here’s one last story for you on this beautiful Father’s Day: Never let it be said that Schuttes let a humorous opportunity go to waste. During our preparation for my grandfather’s funeral, three different people on three separate occasions referred to it as a wedding without realizing their mistake (and yes, I was one of them). There are plenty of opportunities for amusing comments here, but I also think there is a deeper truth, for aren’t we all called to that heavenly wedding feast?

Happy Father’s Day, Dad. I love you.