Holiday heirlooms: Remembering a quiet dad

Growing up in Columbia Heights, Deborah Jindra never had much in common with her father. She was "a bookish city kid" who wanted to travel and go to college.

He was a quiet, reserved man who'd grown up on a dairy farm, dropped out of high school during World War II and made his living with his hands, working with sheet metal.

They shared some good times. As a little girl, she remembers listening to Twins games on the radio together, and sitting on his lap to read the "funny papers." But once she grew too big for his lap, there was little conversation.

"We never had any big fights. We just didn't have anything to talk about," said Jindra, who now lives in Minnetrista. "He was constantly bewildered by his artsy-fartsy daughter."

When she announced plans to attend the University of Minnesota, he was "perplexed," she recalled. "He thought I should get married. It was a different era."

Jindra graduated from the U, then went on to earn a master's degree in library science from St. Catherine's. After she bought her first house, a fixer-upper, as a single woman, her dad helped her with home-improvement projects, crawling under her front porch to wire her doorbell, and bolting her flower pots in place after someone stole her flowers.

"That's the way he showed his love — doing things," she said.

Then in 1991, her father died suddenly. He was only 67, and the loss was a shock.

Jindra's mother went through his things, eventually working her way to his basement workshop. There, tucked among his perfectly organized tools was a handkerchief, wrapped around a tiny pair of baby shoes. They were Jindra's.

She was surprised — and deeply touched. After her mother gave her the shoes, "I thought about all the times I should have made more of an effort to connect with him," she said. "I wish I'd asked a lot more about his life on the farm. You don't think of that stuff until it's too late."

For more than 20 years, she has hung the baby shoes on her Christmas tree, in honor of her father — and as a reminder to herself. "I try to honor his memory, but also strive to communicate better with those I love."

Kim Palmer