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From:
Mary Powers
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Saturday, January 16, 2021
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Written by Michael Powers (son)
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EULOGY FOR RICHARD JOHN POWERS
by Michael Powers (in his favorite font)
January 11, 2021
We are brought together to say goodbye to a wonderful husband, father, and grandfather.
Richard was born 82 years, 3 months, and 23 days ago in Seattle, Washington. The son of parents with a strong Catholic faith. Richard had one sister and four brothers (Pat, Joe, Gerald, Dan, and Mike). He referred to them as “Pitsy Pat,” “Joe boy,” Ger boy,” “Din Dan,” and “Big Mike.” Richard grew up in Seattle’s Rainier Valley neighborhood, went to Catholic primary school, and then Franklin High School. Some of his childhood school memories that he shared with me were usually related to either the nuns in primary school or sports in high school. He said that the nuns were strict and would wrap you on the knuckles if you got out of line. He has some stories about those days in his novel, “The Law of Union Street.” Richard would have liked an excerpt from the novel shared with a note that the names have been changed to protect the innocent…
---------- The Law of Union Street (sample begin) ----------
That day, Ray, Tony, Reno, and the rest of the boys stumbled and laughed their way into St. Edward's classroom No. 20l. Mud and grass stains covered their salt and pepper cords. Their navy-blue V-neck sweaters were stretched out of shape and full of tear holes. Their pants and sweaters were covered with blood from smashed noses, skinned knees and scraped elbows. They were two hours late coming back from lunch.
Sister Mary Joseph's face flamed with anger. She held a large, sturdy ruler in her right hand and slowly slapped it into the palm of her left hand.
"Everyone line up against the wall!" she yelled in the squeaky voice that matched her thin frame and wire-rimmed glasses. She motioned the late returnees toward the front of the classroom. Ray, Tony and Reno scooted to the far end of the line. The girls in the classroom shifted in their seats to get a better look.
"What's the meaning of this?" Was she giving the boys a chance to explain? "Why are you late coming back from lunch?"
"Well 'Stir," Tony piped up. "We were playing at the park, see, and about a quarter to one we looked over and saw some guys try to kidnap a kid. We all ran over and came to the kid's rescue. The kid got away and we tried to hold onto the kidnappers until the Bulls arrived. And - and we had a hell, ah, I mean a heck of a time fighting with 'em. Finally, they started running away and . . . and we chased 'em for several blocks trying to catch up with 'em, and that's why we're late."
"Everyone hold out your hands, knuckles up, palms down!" The girls giggled. Sister turned the ruler on edge. "Crunch" sounds filled the room as the ruler came down hard on knuckles.
When she got to Tony, Sister really wound up. She came from high above her head. He was really going to pay for his fabrication. Tony closed his eyes as the ruler whooshed toward his outstretched knuckles. He may have to cry at this one.
Tony didn't hear a "crunch." He opened his eyes to a terrible sight. Reno was behind Sister. He had his left arm around her neck in a stranglehold. He slowly twisted her arm with his right hand, trying to get her to drop the ruler.
The class was suddenly quiet, except for Reno's girlfriend, Susan. A muffled giggle slipped through the fingers covering her mouth.
Sister held tight to the ruler and started to cry. Reno's stranglehold caused Sister's hood to slip sideways. Her right ear was exposed. Strange. Tony had never seen a nun's ear before. It was bright pink, almost transparent. Reno put his mouth close to her ear and whispered something. A faint smile crossed her lips. Then she laughed. She laughed so hard her glasses fell from her nose to the floor. and the ruler fell harmlessly to her feet. Reno bent over and picked up Sister's glasses and cavalierly handed them back to her. He picked up the ruler, broke it over his knee, threw it into a wastepaper basket and walked calmly back to his desk with a big grin on his face.
"All right. Everyone back to your desks and no more of this foolishness," Sister squeaked. She quickly straightened her habit. After school, everyone rushed up to Reno in the schoolyard, wanting desperately to know what he had whispered to Sister Mary Joseph to defuse the situation…
Richard had a flair for the dramatic at times. When I was in college, he asked me to have my English professor review his book and she was a bit shocked. Needless to say, “The Law of Union Street” went through several revisions. I am putting the final revision online. If you would like to read it let me know. He told me that once he was gone, he wasn’t going to worry about keeping any secrets.
---------- The Law of Union Street (sample end) ----------
Back to the tribute...
At Franklin High School, Richard was quite an athlete. His first love was basketball, but he was also pressured into playing football. Someone once told him, “A big dumb Swede at 6 foot 3 inches, you should be playing football.” He was not good at saying no until later in life so he played both sports. He was a tight end in football and he told me the most enjoyable part of playing that position was knocking over the entire front line because you were on the end. But his true love was basketball. One of my first memories of him playing basketball was at the YMCA. I must have been 5 years old. He flawlessly drove to the hoop for layups, over and over again. Nobody could stop him. Much later I found out that he was kicked off the Franklin basketball team because he was playing for two organizations at the same time which was against the rules. It was a big scandal but he said he loved the game so much he wanted to play all the time. When it came time for me to play sports, he never encouraged me to play football and he never really taught me how to play basketball other than shooting hoops in the driveway of our house. He installed a basketball hoop over the garage - another one of my earliest memories. For some reason, our sports time revolved around baseball. We had a narrow corridor in our backyard house in Ballard’s Blue Ridge neighborhood. It was the perfect setup for a pitcher and a catcher – and that’s what we did. Over and over and over again I would hear, “reach back” and “hit the mitt.” His way of teaching also included books. One of the books he gave me (the first book he ever gave me) was, “Pitching” by Bob Shaw. When looking for this book on Amazon just now, I see it is worth $768.57. Nice investment, Rich.
Richard went to every one of my baseball games. EVERY SINGLE TIME on the drive home if I were down on myself for whatever reason he would tell me at least 3 good things I did in the game. What I know now is those words of encouragement and the confidence building of sports with my dad are precious childhood experiences for which I’m very grateful. If you have ever watched a kid’s sports game, you can see that the parents can get very upset and lose their cool and put pressure on the kids. My dad never lost his cool, never pressured me, and never set unrealistic expectations. The drive to improve and achieve was naturally there in my relationship with him without ever saying a word. He was simply a great example and role model, and that was enough. Truly a unique relationship I’ve never seen with anyone else.
Richard was also the first child to go to college. He met and married my mom, they had my sister, and then he worked his way through 4 years of undergraduate and 3 more years of law school, paying his way and supporting the family at the same time. That included my grandmother who lost her husband young. They lived near the University of Washington stadium, right next to the Burgermaster.
To say that Richard loved the law is an understatement. He is the most well read, educated person I know. He was a History and English double major. After graduating from Law school, he was recruited by the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover. He was part of the “counterintelligence” division and his job was to keep track of Soviet spies. He loved that job, but he could see that part of working for the FBI was moving around a lot. They would suddenly transfer agents without much warning. So true to his nature, he put his family first because he knew this would be too disruptive for me and my sister. After I was born, he left the FBI and moved back to Seattle and started a law practice. I don’t think he would mind me saying this because he said it to me all the time, “Don’t be a lawyer.” Studying the law and being a lawyer are two different things. I had the privilege of being his legal assistant for two years when I was in my early twenties and watched him in action. He was dedicated to his clients, extremely professional, extremely thorough in everything he did, but was not very good at the business side. Money was not a priority to him other than paying the bills. It took him a long time and some great counseling to really understand the fact he just didn’t much like conflict - something that is required when practicing law. My mom told him he should have been a schoolteacher; he would have been a great history teacher. One of the things he would also say, “Don’t sit there at the bar and tell people stories about what you should have done, could have done. Own your decisions and the outcomes and move forward.” At some point he began to specialize in areas like wills, estate planning, and real estate law. It was nice to see him find his niche and in those areas he did very well. He had a loyal client following because of his reputation of honest, thorough, and conscientious work. Even in his last days he was still giving me instructions on what to do with his client files. His dedication to his work and the law upset me at times because all I wanted him to do in retirement was play golf, but that’s not who he was. He was a professional.
Richard also knew just about everything on every topic - except for math and science. As a father he set the bar high without ever saying a word. I can’t think of a single instance where I was pressured to be or do anything I didn’t want to, but I always felt the need to live up to his standard of accomplishments. He was a hard man to compare yourself to. He would destroy everyone in Trivial Pursuit - up until it came to answering a question about math and science. Had it not been for math and science, and computers, I would have probably felt in his shadow to this day. It gave me a great sense of pride to be able to teach him how to use his first computer, and how to play chess (a game of geometry and patterns). It was a rather fun experience to watch your superhero try to figure out how to use a mouse.
Richard was also a fan of genealogy. Using his FBI training he was great at tracking stuff down. He found and “interviewed” many of our distant relatives and documented everything. Through his work I have a sense of gratefulness to know where I came from. Richard comes from English, Swedish, and Irish descent. In the late ‘90s we took a trip together to see our ancestors. He went to Sweden fist. Again, true to his nature, he purchased a headstone and plot for one of his ancestors who didn’t have anything but a record on microfilm. I met him in England, and we traveled up through Scotland (my heritage on my mom’s side). I am forever grateful to not only have this time with my dad but to see where I came from. We went to places like Stratford-upon-Avon where Shakespeare lived, toured the Royal Airforce where one of my great uncles was a WWI pilot, then up to the River Clyde in Scotland where my great grandfather built ships for the Royal Navy. We were so impressed with what we saw and one of the funniest things we did was to shoe each other away when taking pictures. Neither of us had a clue that taking a picture of something is about having you in it. So, we have lots of pictures of that trip except for only a few of us. Doh.
Richard was dedicated to my mother (June). Some of my earliest memories was coming home from playing and finding him and my mom on the bed talking after he came home from work. It just occurred to me right now they might not have been talking. I watched them go through numerous ups and downs as most families do but they had their routines, like going to the Black Angus and watching Jim Washburn play the piano. We also went to Reno, Las Vegas, and Vancouver Canada every year. There was nothing like a road trip to Las Vegas in the mid-70s riding in a Buick LeSabre with no air conditioning. My mom was addicted to the slot machines. She would hold her hand out looking for money from him and then go off only to come back a few hours later and hold her hand out again, but this time is was covered in black from the handle of the slot machine. If she ever won a jackpot our vacation would abruptly end and we were back in the car driving home. He said that we had to get out of there while we were ahead before your mom loses everything. We also had a regular routine of going to Canada where my mom is from. The White Spot restaurant, Stanley Park, and the Capilano Suspension Bridge in Vancouver were a yearly family event.
On May 23, 2013 my mom had a life altering stroke that she never fully recovered from. I’m not sure how to adequately express how heartwarming it was to see the amount of dedication he gave to her care. This was the most traumatic event in our family and there was a lot of confusion on what to do and how to handle things. As we looked at the cost and feasibility of taking care of her, he insisted on making sure she lived at home and that everything she needed would be provided. The cost of caring for her took all his life savings, and his time, and came at a great expense to his emotional wellbeing. But he did it, day after day after day. He was always looking out for her, always making sure she was comfortable. When he died some people in the room asked, do you think he’s going to heaven, and I said, there is no doubt about it. His unwavering and consistent dedication to my mom was the most extraordinary things I’ve seen any human do for another.
In his last couple of months, I had the opportunity to drive him to doctor’s appointments and errands. Every outing we went to Burgermaster, his favorite place. His mind was sharp and although he knew his health was declining, was in good spirits. We would always tell me, “Hey Mike, I volunteered to come down here.” He loved being alive. He was a shy person but loved talking to people, so he overcame his shyness and developed quite a personality that was unique to him. If you knew him well, you know what I mean. He told me that he felt blessed to have two great children for whom he was very proud. I told him that we are who we are because of him and my mom.
As with any loss, I feel a mix of emotions. The richness that he brought to my life is now a set of memories, but the foundation of who I am, because of him, will remain until my last days. Thank you, dad, I couldn’t have asked for anything more. You should have a lot of company waiting for you at the rainbow bridge. Emma, Shadow, BB, and Blondie are waiting for you…
I think the way Richard wanted us to feel about his passing can best be expressed by the following poem:
Do Not Stand at My Grave and Weep
by
Mary Elizabeth Frye
Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there, I do not sleep.
I am in a thousand winds that blow,
I am the softly falling snow.
I am the gentle showers of rain,
I am the fields of ripening grain.
I am in the morning hush,
I am in the graceful rush
Of beautiful birds in circling flight,
I am the starshine of the night.
I am in the flowers that bloom,
I am in a quiet room.
I am in the birds that sing,
I am in each lovely thing.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there. I did not die.
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Julie Powers
1/18/2021 at 8:19 PM
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Monday, January 18, 2021 at 8:19 PM
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I love you Dad!
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