Michael D. Davis.

Alright, last Sunday was Father’s Day, so let me tell ya a story of me and The Old One. And yes, throughout this column I will be referring to my father as The Old One.

This is for two reasons, one The Old One is a nickname given to my father years ago by my sister, out of affection or derision, I do not know, but it has caught on. (Okay, it was derision.) And two, he’s older than dirt, no offense to him when he reads this, but it’s true.

So, The Old One worked for decades at the City of Toledo, doing any number of things, but there was one thing he helped with that you may not have thought of. Funerals. Well, not the funeral per se, but the peripheral tasks.

He helped dig the hole, put up and take down the tent, roll out and roll up the fake grass, put up and put down the chairs, and ultimately after all that fill the whole back up with dirt. One of the only and best bonding activities I’ve ever had with The Old One was when, on weekends and summers he’d bring me along to help with these things. (I know what you’re saying, that explains a lot, but shut up.)

I loved to help with a good weekend funeral. Me and The Old One would eat lunch in the shade of a tree in the cemetery waiting for the mourners to leave. Watching the vault guy, who had just changed into a suit five minutes ago behind a headstone, solemnly lower the coffin. My favorite Wilbert Vault guy was named Barney; he was cool.

Among other things, how many kids can say they helped their father bury a body when their teachers ask what they did that weekend? Speaking of school, that’s what this story is mainly about. I could go on and on about the weekend funerals and one day I might, but I wanted to tell you this story today.

So, we had just finished putting the tools away, patting down the dirt on the grave. It was time to head back to the City Shop and then go home. It was me, The Old One, and his friend and coworker I have dubbed in this column Col. Mustard.

We were driving a two-door City truck, Col. Mustard was driving, I was in the passenger’s seat, and The Old One sat in the bed of the truck. As we were going through Toledo, I looked in the rearview mirror to make sure The Old One was still back there and I saw it. My Father was sitting on the side of the bed with a couple of inches of sweaty plumber’s crack showing. I don’t know if anyone glanced out their windows that day, but if they did they would’ve gotten an eye full.

When we get to the shop, and out of the truck, I inform The Old One that his crack was out for the entire trip. It is at this moment that my Father said a line that went down in history. He said, “If they don’t like it, they don’t gotta look.” I took that to heart.

Cut to that week in school. My class is in the school library, I was leaning over a table filling out a sheet on a book. Having been plagued with droopy shorts since before I could walk a bit, I found myself in a similar situation to The Old One.

Another student complained to the librarian. The librarian told me to pull up my shorts. And I said to them, what my father had said to me, “If you don’t like it, you don’t gotta look at it.”

Well, suffice it to say that didn’t go over well. My Ma started telling me after that not to repeat anything The Old One says. And through trial and error, with incidents not unlike this one, I have found my Ma’s advice to be solid.

But I do have to admit, being short, fat, with a middle finger on my back, the phrase If you don’t like it, you don’t gotta look at it, has been words to live by.