A Father’s Day Polka

My husband Vince is a man of simple pleasures, difficult to buy for and easy to please.

He loves his family, camp fires, river floats, booyah and smoked meat.

Inexplicably, given his limited exposure to the genre in his childhood, he also loves to polka.

Every year since he first discovered it, Vince and I, along with various assortments of our children, have spent Father’s Day at the St. Stanilaus polka mass, followed by a tent dance with the Maroszek Brothers polka band.

The mass, dance and picnic were all canceled this year, due to COVID-19 concerns. However, thanks to our clever, quirky daughter Molly, Vince still got to dance.

In addition to cooking him a smoked brisket, baking him a delicious cake and helping us stack a bunch of wood Sunday morning, Molly surprised Vince by playing “Roll Out the Barrel” on the giant, old accordion she’d lugged up to our cabin for the occasion.

It is important to note that Molly doesn’t actually play the accordion, she just owns one because she thought some day she might like to take it up.

So she spent the week leading up to Father’s Day secretly learning the song. Some day she will have to explain to me how she managed to secretly practice the accordion in a home she shares with us. In any case, her repertoire now includes two songs, the polka and “Silent Night,” which should cover her from now through December.

She played, we danced, and we all got to enjoy another opportunity to celebrate the very best things in life — good food, sweet music and love.

I hope all of you had a similarly happy day celebrating your fathers.

On that note, I have to say how especially lucky we are to celebrate Father’s Day in my dad’s cabin in the woods. Happy Father’s Day to all the dads who are no longer with us as well.

Your love lives on.