When I Grow Up

I saw "When I Grow Up" 40 years ago, have not only been looking for it ever since, but have also tried in vain to find anyone else in the world who has even heard of it. Even now, I can't tell the story line of the film without holding back tears when I get to the "Mom, where's Dad?" scene when Bobby Driscoll finally comes out of his fever coma.

Like the boy in the film, I also never achieved the going fishing relationship with my father that the film symbolizes. But I thought I would, "maybe next week or the month after that." And when my father died, "When I Grow Up" was one of the first things I thought of as having been a reminder or a warning that I hadn't heeded soon enough.

But when my own son was born, I remembered it and I heeded it. And the message of "When I Grow Up" was with my son and me all of the days of my Brandon's childhood. With a little luck, in a few years I'll be the grandfather responding to my grandson, "You know, I can't think of anything I'd rather do" when he says to me "Hey, Grandpa. Let's go fishing."