Father-Son Bondage

In memoirs, we learn about the author’s relationships with people in their family. In Fathers, Sons, & Brothers: The Men in My Family, Bret Lott suggests that the relationship with his father was the most influential in his own life. When becoming a father himself, the unusual bond he had with his father, Bill, helped him through fatherhood.

Bret had always had a view of this amazing father figure; Bill had a good job with Royal Crown Cola as vice president and supplied for the family. One instance that we see a bond begin between Bret and his father is when his father got a job back in California after moving from there to Arizona, and back again. Bill, known as the “father of few words” (7), comes into his room early in the morning and hands him an index card with the words:
“ ‘ God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference’" (8).

The thought that Bret would “appreciate that” (8) made a big impact on Bret to bring up in this essay; he was “stunned” and saw what he thought was “supposed” to be a smile from his father, which reveals how little emotion Bill actually shows to his son (9). This appreciation for his father continues on through the essay “In the Garage,” about organizing his own garage and the small amount of tools he has; “Like father, like son” (10). And he finished it off with a “discard pile outside, a pile so high I know I’ve done my father proud” (10).

What evolved the bond between Lott and his son, Bret, was the Royal Crown; Bill was vice president and had his sons start working for him there. The hero-figure Bill Lott represented was very pronounced when Bret was younger because children always view their parents as perfect superheroes. When Saturday chores were done, the Lott brothers went with their father to different stores to check out the RC pop that was displayed or still needed in the store. “This was our father, an adult, a man; and this was his job: to come into a store and talk of sports” (37). This image represents the further impact Bill had on his sons. Bret started out working on washing the trucks out with his brothers, when working was still fun. He moved up to sweeping out lots the next summer, Bill got to work one-on-one with Bret; he kept coming out day after day, teaching Bret how to sweep a lot by pushing with a push broom (41). It’s not that Bret didn’t know how to push broom, Bret just “dogged”(31) it because of the heat.
A significant turn of events occurs when Bill takes Bret on a stop they have to make because of the broken down shipment truck. Bret noticed a difference with his father but “didn’t recognize this joy in him, only wondered at why he seemed to be smiling when all we had before us was a long trek into the desert” (44). Because of his family growing, Bill had to give up his life of driving trucks to get a higher position to help support his family; this shows how caring Bill is of his family along, including the progression of his sons into the real world. Bret became closer to his father when working for RC Cola because Bill would always wake him up in the morning and they would get breakfast and M&M’s in the afternoon. Ironically, his father showed him later when he returned to RC Cola before going off to college, a donut shop that symbolized the connection between Bret and his father. “There was no waiting room here, no inside place from which to order . . . They had bear claws” (168), with bear claws being what he always got on the way to work with Bill.

For comic relief, the situation where Bret asked his mother where babies came from at the dinner table shows his father’s awkwardness, so to say. “My dad’s instantaneous reaction, enough to make me flinch. . . ‘Hey,’ he said again, ‘don’t talk like that!” (91) was quite astounding and was upset that he shouldn’t ask that during dinner. Years later, Bill had “The Talk” as people would say, but technically not so. It was so humorous to see Bill being so uncomfortable as “his eyes hadn’t yet mine. . . I had him, had him in a way I’d never known before: my dad, powerless, stunned” (94). Bret didn’t really gain any information from his father, but this moment of weakness that shined through made him ever closer with him. The image of his father’s laugh that “was a good laugh, a solid laugh, a kind of laugh I hadn’t heard or seen before: It was a laugh that didn’t take me into account, didn’t pretend to cajole me or to praise me. He wasn’t even looking at me. This was just laughter” (94). This particular part of “The Talk” memory was something new Bret learned about his very shy-like father.

By the essay, “Royal Crown 2,” Bret self focused on his father and how he truly impacted his life, even though he just writes and doesn’t do the kind of manual labor his father taught him as hard work. Because of the guidance Bill gave to Bret; waking him up early and eating “Cornnuts and M&M’s together” was what Bret said knows “only now, were his attempts to guide me and my brothers the only way he knew how” (189). And because of this guidance and the effort he put into his children, Bret understands the great bond between his father and himself.