It was May 10, Mother’s Day 1992, I was sitting in my living room on Avenue P in Brooklyn.
My wife and I had plans to see my two sets of parents that day to honor my mom and her husband and my dad and his wife.
But I knew something was wrong from the moment I woke up. Brooding in the living room, I was inconsolable and my wife at the time was quite concerned.
I just had a really bad feeling. I can’t remember feeling that way ever, and it was as if I just KNEW what was happening without it happening yet.
Then the phone rang.
My step-mother informed me that my dad had died a few hours earlier.
I called my sister and let her know.
That was a tough day as the question loomed large over my existence: why did she wait that long to call? I guess I will never know the answer to that.
Eventually we had the funeral and she gave me two watches that were his and a pocket watch that was my grandfathers.
The Germinal Voltaire is a round faced, manual wind watch with a date window at the 3 o’clock position.
Over time I had it serviced at one of the watch shops and it still runs.
The luminous markers around the dial are long since gone and the ones on the hands have deteriorated – you can see through the minute hand in certain spots.
For now it sits in the safe and for a couple 24s each year, I wear it around the time of his death as a reminder.
