Patsy and Frank
“Music is either a sedative or a tonic to the soul.”
The evening of May 2nd 2020, the day after I found out I was Bobby Drakulic’s daughter, I called my mom on a mission.
“I need you to tell me everything you remember about him.”
“He loved the Pittsburgh Steelers and Frank Sinatra,” she replied.
Despite being in a state of equal parts shock and exhaustion, my heart warmed hearing this. At this point, I knew my dad was alive, but he didn’t yet know about me. I couldn’t predict what his reaction would be to the news, or if I’d get the chance to meet him, but still, I floated off into a daydream, that went like this:
Sundays are our routine father/daughter hangouts. He’s the kind of dad who eagerly anticipates the arrival of his daughter every week. We sit in his house, in his favorite room, the one with a faint yet constant linger of cigar smoke. He won’t smoke while I’m there but he extinguishes with my arrival. The fireplace is the focal point, framed by a brick wall, which we sit facing in matching dark brown leather chairs. The record player lives on a table at his side, within reach to drop the needle to “listen to that again.” We have a gentle burn of scotch in the back of our throats as we listen. Sinatra is in heavy rotation.
The daydream download hit me fully in a matter of seconds, as if I’d unlocked a complete memory from a fortress in the back of my mind.
A week after this call with my mom I would be in my dad’s house (detailed in Newsletter #13). Although his house didn’t look like the one of my imagination, there was a whiff of cigar. There wasn’t a turntable in the living room, but there was a stereo. On the last night of that week-long visit, it happened - we played out the daydream. He announced we should have a scotch, and asked me to follow him into his living room. I sat on his couch, which was dark brown, though not leather.
He walked over to a cabinet, and pulled out a stack of CD’s. He inserted one into his Bose Wave, and he played “Crazy” by Patsy Cline. When the song finished, he carefully removed Patsy and replaced her with Frank. He chose the classic, “My Way,” and explained to me that Frank actually hated the song. That’s when déjà vu hit. I looked at my dad, holding his whisky glass, and said, “I had a daydream about this very moment, with us in your living room, drinking scotch and listening to Sinatra. The house I imagined was different, and you were playing vinyl records, but I’m feeling déjà vu. I dreamt of this happening.” With a loss of words and misty eyes, we clinked our glasses and sat in silence listening to Frank croon.
Since my dad passed, I connect to my dad through Sinatra, sometimes intentionally, sometimes not. I’ll hear Sinatra in a cafe or coming from the speakers of a passing car. When I miss him, which I often do, I ask Alexa to play music by Frank Sinatra and it’s as if my dad’s playing DJ from another dimension. On a particularly hard day a few weeks after he passed, I was listening to a random shuffling of music of no particular genre when Frank’s version of “For Once in My Life” started. I’d never heard his version before.
For once in my life I have someone who needs me / Someone I've needed so long
For once unafraid I can go where life leads me and somehow I know I'll be strong
No doubt this song was penned as a romantic love song, but at that moment I knew with certainty, it was a father/daughter love song. My dad was reminding me that he was only ever a Sinatra song away, and that I healed his heart as much as he healed mine.
For once I can touch what my heart used to dream of / Long before I knew / Someone warm like you / Who have my dreams come true
For once I have someone I know won't desert me / I'm not alone anymore
For once I can say / This is mine you can't take it / As long as I know I have love I can make it / For once in my life I have someone who needs me
And with that, I’m off to pour myself some scotch and cheers my dad, who I like to imagine is decked out in a lounge with Mr. Sinatra, keeping their eyes on their daughters below.
Until next Sunday,
Stephanie
P.S. Check out Frank singing For Once in My Life on YouTube here.
My dad, circa 1962, with “This is Sinatra!” album seen in background.
Bonus pic of my dad just because he looks Sinatra-level cool. Circa 1965.
