Dad's Strong Box

My dad had an old strong box that he kept packed away in a dark corner of his side of the bedroom closet. It was a safe place for all of his physical memories, full of photos, letters, and other miscellanea that were special to him. It was one of my favorite things to do as a kid, sitting with him on the bed, sifting through all of these old items, each having their own story that he couldn't wait to tell.

About five months after he died, I returned home for our Grand Re-Opening of Darrell's Bar. While there, my mom and I pulled out the old strong box and emptied it onto the bed, as I had so many times before with my dad. It had been quite a while, though, since the last time I looked at these things. While most of the items were familiar to me, it was a new experience to examine them now, as an adult.

I regret not taking a photo of the actual strong box, but I did take photos of it's contents. Normally, I'd whittle the pictures down to the most interesting or important when posting them here, but, eh, I feel like loading up! Here goes.

The last photo here, of a letter, is part of a collection of letters that I decided to keep and bring home with me. I didn't count, but it's a stack nearly three inches tall of letters my dad wrote home during his time in the Air Force in the 60's. The one shown above perfectly captures the heart of every Cleveland Browns fan in the history of Cleveland Browns fans.

"How do you like the Browns this year? They sure are getting off to a bad start. They do good in the first half then puter [sic] out in the last. That sure isn't going to when [sic] them many games. Maybe against Atlanta but that's it. Well, maybe they'll improve as the season progresses. I sure hope so."

With this, I've decided upon a new weekly post. I'm not sure who will actually be interested in this, but I know I am, so there. I'll post a letter (and type it out for easy reading) each Thursday. Some of them may be boring, some of them are kind of funny, but either way, I find them interesting and I'm hoping that maybe someone else will, too.