Thank you, Dad

Last weekend Rob and I attended a memorial service for a 94-year-old man who left quite a legacy in our church, community, and beyond. It was a touching service and, as so often happens, I learned a few things about Jim that I wish I had known when he was alive. So much more to talk about if I had only known what questions to ask.

Jim had three sons, all older than me and grappling with the weirdness of intense grief mixed with intense gratitude.

Each son shared a tribute to his dad, each thanking him for specific and general things Jim did. As I listened, I kept hoping Jim could hear, that he really was looking down on us, that his heart was full from being told by his three boys that he was fantastic at the most important job he ever took on.

The more I sat with those hopes, the more I knew I never want that to be me. I never want to be sitting somewhere telling other people what I so deeply appreciate about my dad and hoping to God that Dad is somehow listening.

So Dad, today I want to thank you.

Thank you for teaching me how to be a grown up. Thank you for teaching me how to accept responsibility and do things that need to be done regardless if I feel like doing them.

Thank you for teaching me how to ride a bike. I still remember turning around, fully expecting to see you still holding onto my bike’s seat and instead seeing you a basketball court away, smiling as big as I had ever seen you smile.

Thank you for helping me get through Mr. Schissler’s 6th grade math class with that awful, outdated math book from the 1940s. Thanks to you, not him, I am still a master at figuring out percentages.

Thank you for helping me become a better writer. Although I was sometimes crushed to see all the red penned suggestions, all that red ink helped me later discover a hobby that has taken me unexpected and joy-filled places.

Thank you for taking on the responsibility for a wife and a baby at only 22 years old. Many guys in your situation would have walked away, right then or later. Instead, you were a man who…49 years later…is still in for the long haul. And yes, I know Mom and I can be quite a haul!

Thank you for being an example of marriage. Thank you for showing me what commitment looks like and what a promise really means.

Thank you for teaching me the importance of always having the right tool for the job.

Thank you for serving your country in Vietnam. I remember saving all my Band-Aid wrappers for you while you were gone. I’m not quite sure what my 2-year-old mind was thinking, but I’m so grateful you didn’t come home with any big boo-boos.

Thank you for passing along your incredible organizational skills and adoration for documentation. While I don’t have nearly as many self-written How To binders as you, I am very proud of the half-dozen or so I do have.

Thank you for not telling me how weird my college boyfriend was until long after it was safe to do so.

Thank you for loving my husband and unhesitatingly embracing him as family.

Thank you for teaching me to drive a stick shift and for not getting mad when I got side-swiped by that drunk driver while I still had my permit.

Thank you for buying me my first car. We lived in a community where that was pretty normal. So ashamedly, it wasn’t until years later that I appreciated the sacrifice you and Mom made for me. I wish I could go back to that 17-year-old and open her eyes a bit.

Thank you for refusing to pay me for my grades. You knew the greater value of me striving for good grades for myself instead of for money. I continue to appreciate learning for learning’s sake thanks to what I whined was your stubbornness and tightwadiness.

Thank you for forcing me to help you do income taxes even back in grade school. All those receipts! Because of those early lessons, I am organized and prepared and unfazed when tax time rolls around each year.

Thank you for introducing me to the concept of Informational Interviews when I began searching for my first real-world job. I learned so much from people living my dream and I ended up with a couple of unexpected job offers on the spot. I have passed along your advice to other career-searchers many many times.

Thank you for crying when I was 7 years old and you told me Grandpa died. I had never seen you cry before and your tears confused me but also helped me understand that grown-ups get hurt, too.

Thank you for being my IT Tech Support…long before that term even existed.

Thank you for replacing that groovy orange set of children’s encyclopedias with that beautiful set that saved me many trips to the library in junior high and high school (hey kids today, we had it rough in the pre-Google days. We had to have our parents drive us to the library so we could look up stuff…in books!).

Thank you for taking me fishing when we lived in Montana and for trying to teach me how to take care of my freshly caught trout…even if it did lead to over 40 years of seafood aversion. But with my recent discovery of Mahi Mahi, the yuck-to-fish tide is slowly turning!

Thank you for driving your RV nearly 700 miles in one day with me, my cat, and a small cellar's worth of wine to Rob’s and my new home in Washington. And for letting me choose the radio station yet again.

Thank you for teaching me how to bowl and refusing to let me take the easy way out by rolling the ball between my legs like all the other kids. Because you were such a meanie, nearly a decade later I earned the only sports trophies of my life several years in a row. Although I don't bowl anymore because of my back, the last ball I threw was a strike.

Thank you for not tolerating me trying to use tears to get my way. I saw other kids being crybabies and it was so effective! But not with you. As an adult, I think I have more self-respect because I don’t try to manipulate people using my emotions. But wow, as I kid I sure wanted to!

Thank you for having high expectations for me. There are still few things greater to my heart than knowing I have made you proud.

Thank you for working so hard for so many years, often taking you away from the two people you were working so hard for. You made it possible for Mom to stay home with me until I was ready to be home by myself. You made it possible for me to not feel like an outcast in a ridiculously brand-name-focused community. You made it possible for me to graduate college without student loans. You never made me eat beets and sauerkraut.

Thank you for loving Mom from that first moment in the Student Union in Pocatello hanging around a pool table.

Thank you for loving me from that first moment you became my daddy.

I love you, Dad. Thank you for being mine.