I usually don't get too personal with my blog entries and I especially don't talk that much about my family. Not that my family is bad or anything, it's a wee bit too personal. Today's blog entry is different and perhaps I may write more blog entries about my family in the future. On this day five years ago, I lost my father Carlo "Carl" Palladino. Born on September 12, 1944, the youngest of 3 children. My dad was a hard working man and all around good person. He owned his own garage door business that he had since the mid-1960's. I don't know much as else about his childhood or anything like that since he rarely talked about that. I do know that my uncle (my dad's 2nd oldest brother) has shed some light about the Palladino family. Unfortunately, I'm not in touch with my uncle anymore and I'll probably not get more information about the Palladino family.
As I said, he was a hard worker and I believe he also enjoyed installing garage doors, repairing garage doors and installing electric garage door openers. His line of work was difficult and dangerous, so he didn't want me to get into it. Besides work, he also enjoyed watching sports (baseball, football and tennis were his favorites if I remember correctly), spending time with his family and investing money on the stock market. He was also a little bit of gamer too (my mother is a little bit of a gamer as well), he had an Atari in the 1980's. I have fond memories of my dad such as playing video games with him, learning how to drive with his car and even working for his garage door company during the last years of his life.
I also have memories of him and I attending sports games at arenas and stadiums. We attended games that had New York and New Jersey sports teams playing such as the New York Yankees and the New Jersey Nets (now the Brooklyn Nets). He was a big fan of the New York Yankees. I believe we also went to a New York Mets game. Thanks to him I got to see one of the greatest athletes of the 20th century, Wayne Gretzky. That was during Gretzky's last years in the NHL, he played for the New York Rangers. We attended two New York Rangers games at Madison Square Garden. Interestingly, the first time was the New York Rangers vs. Edmonton Oilers and the second and final time we attended a game together was the New York Rangers vs. Edmonton Oilers.
We also attended music shows too. I went to Youthfest at RCC in the late 1990's, I went to my first live music show. I saw Civil Descent (who later became Close My Eyes) perform live and that was awesome. In 2001, we attended the G3 concert at the Beacon Theatre. I saw Joe Satriani, Steve Vai and John Petrucci perform live. He was quite cool with it, but he thought it was too loud if I'm not mistaken. My dad had somewhat of an eclectic taste in music. He liked The Beatles, Queen, Dion, Bob Dylan, Pat Benetar, Blondie and Cyndi Lauper. He mostly listened to oldies, his favorite radio station was WCBS-FM 101.1. He was a bit open to other kinds of music as well. Here's why I say he had an eclectic taste in music, I remember I made him listen to Metallica's Master of Puppets on the beach in the 1990's or 2000's and he shockingly liked it. He liked the first track or the title track, I don't remember. One time Slayer was blasting at Hot Topic and he even liked that! True story!
My dad died of prostate cancer. He also happened to die on his birthday. He would have been 77 years old on this day. Since he unfortunately died of prostate cancer, take a look at Prostate Cancer Foundation website. Educate yourself about it and even donate to the foundation. One day and hopefully soon, people will not have to put up with prostate cancer or cancer in general. It's a shame that my dad had to go through that and I don't wish anyone to get it. My dad got diagnosed with in 2012 and then it got progressively got worse in early 2016. His brother was also diagnosed with prostate cancer as well, however they got to it in time and he's still alive. If you suspect you might have it or know someone else that might have it, of course let your doctors know and also please visit the website for more information.
I did mention about his death in an early blog entry I created in 2019. I originally wasn't going to write a blog entry about the passing of my father, however I figured since it's 5th anniversary... why not? I also wrote this blog entry to spread more awareness of prostate cancer as well. It's sad that people nowadays are against the patriarchy and fathers nowadays set a bad example for people. My dad was a one of kind father, he did his best to provide for his family. He wasn't a deadbeat dad, alcoholic, womanizer, etc. He was loved by many and he was a good person. Sure, he wasn't perfect like most people in the world. Whenever he was present, he brought good vibes with him. People who know him still say good things about him and they remember him well.
In case you want to read it, here is his obituary page. The photo I used above comes from that obituary page and there's also a couple more photos of him as well. Technically those photos originate from my personal archive of photos. R.I.P. dad, I miss you and so does everyone else who knew and loved you do as well.
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