Paul Leon Hefner

For an assignment in high school, I once interviewed his mom – my grandma Max -- about what life was like during the Depression.

I remember her telling me: “There were a lot of men on the road. Lots of times, people would show up at the back door, looking for an odd job and something to eat. You’d help them when you could.”

Simple values like that – hard work, speaking your mind, family, faith, helping others when you can – that was the to-do list of my dad’s life.

When he was just a boy, he and his older brother – my uncle Harry – moved with their parents to a cabin in Southern Oregon, where the family tried to make it in the logging business.

My dad always talked about Oregon as a great boyhood adventure – right up until they went broke. The family then returned to Southern California, where they built a small house in San Fernando.

After high school, dad headed to junior college and then to UCLA, where he met my mom in 1959. He called her Button – as in cute as a Button. Last month was their 54th wedding anniversary.

Dad was a Bruin for life.

We’d always try to make it to the big SC-UCLA football game – even if it was being played at SC. Sometimes our seats would leave us surrounded by SC fans – but we would still cheer ourselves hoarse before the end of the first quarter.

My sister Marcy came along in 1961, and me a year later, and we lived in Sylmar, which was close enough to grandma and grandpa’s that dad would take us there on Saturday mornings, where the adults would sit around the kitchen table, drink coffee and argue about politics.

You see, Hefners love to argue. We love to argue because we are always right. And we always know more than the person we’re arguing with – especially if we’re arguing with another Hefner.

I got in lots of arguments with my dad – never won one, but never lost one either.

The only Hefner who got the better of him once was my son, Kevin, who – at age 4 – took issue with dad about how to get to pre-school.

Dad’s behind the wheel, driving streets he had driven his entire life. Kevin is buckled up in a carseat in the back, screaming – “You’re going the wrong way, Grandpa, You’re going the wrong way!”

I did see my dad win an argument with an inanimate object once -- during a weekend barbecue. Dad was making ribs – a family favorite – but it was a lot of work making the sauce and then turning the ribs one by one on the grill.

Dad found a way to simplify things – a cylindrical basket that attached to the rotisserie motor. The basket had a door on it. You open it up, put the ribs inside, close it up, turn it on – and the ribs turn themselves.

Worked great – for half a revolution. Then the door opened, and the ribs all fell into the charcoal. It wasn’t long before the basket was getting stomped to death on the patio.

And it wasn’t long after that that the basket – or what was left of it – sailed over the house, from the back yard to the driveway. And then, we heard dad start the car.

Can’t remember what we had for dinner that night. But there was no doubt in anyone’s mind -- it was Dad one, basket zero.

Christmas was always a very big deal at our house. As far as dad was concerned, no package was too big to wrap – Marcy remembers my dad wrapping her rocking chair when she was expecting her son Ian – and no matter what the gift was, you could never use enough scotch tape.

Christmas was also the one time of the year when we’d visit my dad at work – to hear him sing Christmas carols with his fellow bankers and eat spaghetti and meatballs at Little Joe’s, the best Italian restaurant in Chinatown.

My dad started as a teller and worked his way up in the banking world, first at Bank of America, and then at United California Bank and at First Interstate Bank, where he was a senior vice president.

I remember my dad talking about one of his projects, this new machine they were putting in – “the pocket teller.” How you were going to be able to get money out whenever you wanted – all you needed was the right card and a four-digit password. How the machine would use the weight of the money to count it out.

For a banker, this was all very exciting stuff.

They put one of the very first pocket tellers at a branch in Northridge – and we drove out there while they were still working on it – the whole thing being kept under wraps. I remember thinking -- this is never going to work.

Today, there are more 2 million ATMs. Before he left banking, dad was Chairman of the Electronic Funds Association, and Chairman of the Bank Marketing Association’s electronic banking council.

Dad left banking in 1989, and after earning certificate in mediation from the Pepperdine School of Law, formed his own business, which he called Words in Motion, specializing in the resolution of Christian church disputes.

My dad dabbled in things like fishing and golf, but music was his true passion. He taught himself to play the snare drum, the piano, the ukulele and the guitar. Growing up, we’d have sing-along parties at the house and dad was always singing in the church choir and performing in church concerts.

Faith and biblical scholarship was an important part of dad’s life. Both mom and Dad were leaders in the 1st Presbyterian Church of San Fernando, serving as elders, leading the senior high group, and helping the church rebuild after the 1971 earthquake. They were still active members when the church closed after more than 100 years in the community.

They joined First Presbyterian Oceanside after retiring to Carlsbad in 1998. Dad sang with the choir, was an active participant in bible study, and served as clerk of the session until last summer.

And until earlier this year, he continued to research and write weekly email devotions that he sent to hundreds of people each week.

In the years before my dad became ill, both mom and dad were tireless volunteers at North Coastal Service Center, which later became Interfaith, organizations dedicated to helping the down and out get back on their feet.

Dad took particular pride in the work he did to keep the center’s food pantry stocked and organized. When dad started to have pain from his arthritis, at first he mistook it for muscle aches from loading frozen holiday turkeys at the center.

Moving to Carlsbad also gave Dad more time with Marcy and her family. Dad loved watching the kids play soccer, listening to Monica perform in the jazz band and watching Ryan play Little League.

At a championship game when Ryan was pitching, whenever a questionable call didn’t go Ryan’s way, Dad loudly cleared his throat. That was Dad, still speaking his mind, and still helping the umpire get it right.

-- Paul Laurence Hefner (Little Paul)