A Tribute To The Best Guy Ever - My Pop

My Pop was such an awesome person. Seriously, no-one will ever compare. He was funny, smart, caring...all those adjectives that come along with a person being amazing.

Our birthday's were a day apart, so we always celebrated together. This made the day extra special for both of us.

In order to celebrate how kick ass he was, I am sharing my top 10 memories with him. 

1. When I told him I had a boyfriend, he replied with "tell him if he hurts you, I'll break every bone in his body".
   
   
2. Riding in the car with him. He never had volume on in the car (if he did it was always classical music at a low volume), so to this day whenever I hear a clicking indicator, my mind takes me back to riding with Pop. Pop used to make furniture, so a lot of these trips involved delivering chairs to others houses.  
   
   
3. Picking up tacks (nails) in his workshop. He had a magnet on a piece of rope, and would give me 1 cent for each tack I collected. This turned out to be a lot in the 80's/early 90's. I would get a good 100 tacks a time, which added up to $1 (a kid could buy a lot of mates at the school canteen with this back then). 
   
   
4. The trade of money once I got my $1. The conversation would go something like this. 
   Him - "How much money you got there Emmy?"
   Me - "$1"
    Him - "I'll trade you your 1 for a 2"
   Me - "Awesome"
   The trade happens.
   Him - "How much money you got there Emmy?"
   Me - "$2"
   Him - "I'll trade you your 2 for a 5"
   Me - (about to burst with 8 year old excitement) "Really?????"
   The trade happens.
   Him - "Don't tell your dad"
   
   
5. Listening to him banter with Nanna. Nanna hated Poppa pulling out his false teeth, so of course what else would he do, but pull them out. He had such a good sense of humour. He once juggled the plates when doing the dishes, and dropped all of Nanna's good china. SMASH! And those terrible jokes. The amount of times I heard this one "Emily Wood is no good, chop her up for firewood, if she is no good for that, feed her to the big Tom cat".
   Nanna and Poppa had so much love for each other. He worked at home, and Nanna would always page him on the intercom for lunch and morning tea. They had such a beautiful relationship. The extent of this can be seen by how much she struggled to continue on without him, 

   
   
6. Morning breakfast. Pop always had the same breakfast. It consisted of an orange, a bowl of Just Right, and a poached egg. While eating it he would read the paper. What made him extra awesome was that he would pick out the sultanas for us so we would eat our cereal (this was usually Just Right, and sometimes even Sultana Bran. It that's not love, then I don't know what is), then when pouring the milk we were required to say the word 'woo' when it was enough. No other word was accepted. I still say 'woo' to this day, when someone is pouring me a drink.
   
   
7. The Little Things - Playing eye-spy in the morning's. When we stayed we would always go straight to Nan and Pop's bed when we woke up, and play some epic games of eye-spy. I can't remember who won, but I remember experiencing such a feeling of safety being there with them.
   Him picking me up so I could put the 1 and 2 cent coins in the huge scales, then see how many stone I weighed. If I remember correctly I usually weighed about 4 stone.
   Watching him do the crossword during morning tea every day.
   *I will continue to edit this section, as more little memories come back me. 

8. 

   With Santa at the Christmas party

   The lodge Christmas party and lodge visits. Pop was high up in the lodge, which if you know anything about the Masonic lodge, it is a very secretive group. It was not until I was much older and talking to someone else who is a member of the lodge, that I found out that that Pop probably should not have shown us the huge Chess board (I swear that's what it was), or shown us the 'secret' hand shake. The best part about him being a member of this was the Christmas parties each year. This was by far my favourite   part of Christmas. There would be egg throwing competitions (my dad was really good at those), peanut hunting comps (we had a group of about 10 of us, and would win. Every. Single. Year), and Santa would arrive on a trailer bearing gifts, followed by trailer rides. Strangely, one of my most vivid   memories of this day was the Peter's Ice-creams in cups, and the supply of soft drinks (which Pop would always sneak more of to us than allowed).

   
   

   

   Even with sacks on we look good.

   

   All tied up and nowhere to go

9. My deb ball. I am a terrible dancer. Poppa was not. When we were dancing together, he told me to stand on his feet, so I looked like I knew what I was doing. He passed away about 5 months after this.

   
   

                              

   
   
10.  My very last memory with him. He got very sick, very quickly. I was in his room as he was     bedridden, and I was telling him all about how I wanted to save up to go to America. I didn't realise it would be one of the last times I would see him. As I was about to leave the room he called to me and said "Emmy, you are the most beautiful girl in the world. Don't let anyone ever tell you any different".
    
    
    *The older I get, the more I realise how much he has impacted who I am. With Pop, I share my love of music, and reading. Since his passing, we have found the letters he wrote to Nanna while he was away during the war. He wrote such beautiful, romantic declarations of love to her. I'd share one, but their love deserves the respect and privacy that they gave each other in life. Just recently I found the last thing he gave me. It is a small teddy bear, holding a heart, that says "I love you". To me, it symbolises everything about our relationship. 
    
    I hope he is proud of the person I have become. Love you Pop.
    
    
    
    
    
    Daggy song, yes, but these lyrics have always reminded me of him. The more I understand about my childhood, the more I know that the love from him and Nanna shaped me to become who I am.