Father's Day

As my father broke down and cried in the foyer of the house we've lived in for over ten years, he told me of how his father is one of the best men he's ever known, but that he never taught him a damn thing about money.  My father, taking on mountains of debt and succeedingly employing extensive budgeting and financial research, has become thoroughly obsessed with money management.

My grandfather, Bill Barber, was once the #2 man in the United Artists movie corporation (that's right, the United Artists Corporation).  Over a period of several years, he slowly, gradually worked his way up, building more and more on his position and on his career.  He planted his roots there, becoming well-established and well-esteemed in the company, and with his position held a great deal of influence.  Within a few years, he no doubt could have become the president of the entire company: seeing seven figure paychecks, never a monetary concern, millions of dollars every year; our entire family, sitting on top-of-the-line everything.

But slowly, a creeping feeling made its way into my grandfather's skull.  He came to a conviction that the corporation he had spent so many years ascending inside was as its core, godless and thoroughly immoral.  He came to believe that the films his company was producing were "corrupting for children to see, bad for families, and immoral in very many ways," and felt that his being in such a high position in the company meant that it was he who allowed these morally corrupting, even evil films to propagate.

So my grandfather resigned.  A pamphlet-sized publication sits on a shelf in his office, a picture of him on the cover, holding a reel of film in his hands and smiling.  The headline reads Bill Barber Left the Movies to Pursue God.


His next job was as a church custodian.

Ever since then, my father laments that even despite appearances, my grandfather lives by the skin of his teeth.  After the Hollywood Grill (which was owned and operated by the Barber family, in case you didn't know) closed, my grandfather apparently declared bankruptcy.  I knew my grandparents weren't wealthy, but this was news to me.  I could see the deep-seated frustration in my father's eyes with my grandfather's decision to leave United Artists; I could see that even though my father asserts that "it's not [his] place to judge the decision," that there's no way he could have ever walked away from all that money.  Even from a religious standpoint, my father utters, Christ spent the bulk of his time in the nucleus of the corrupt, using his time on Earth to try to influence their lives...

I'm still not sure what I think about the decision.  I guess really, I can see both sides.  I can be sure that my grandfather would not have made the decision if he didn't think it was the right one...

But as to how exactly his decision has forever altered the welfare of our family, I guess there's really no way to know.