Father gave all the childhood he had been denied.(Life Today)

I was raised by a man who had no childhood.

My father was orphaned not only by death, but by poverty, rejection and neglect. No one ever taught him to parent. He had no model. He could be harsh, punitive and sometimes inappropriate, but he did his best and we knew he loved us.

Our childhood was all about presents. Maybe there weren't enough pork chops, but we had what we needed. We had what he had missed.

Our toys only came at Christmas but we always got everything on our lists.

I remember walking home from the Central Market, clutching a precious box of junk cereal, ignoring my mother's silent worry, and every night we always had our nickel. After dinner, we walked to the corner store to buy our treat, our penny candy cache of treasure. Much later, I realized how poor we were and came to understand the sacrifice of "the nickel."

Our holiday traditions went on way too long. We searched for Easter baskets …