First I Was A Son
Two years ago this morning, my Dad passed away. To me, the date April 14th has now been redefined forever. As this date neared, and ultimately arrived, I have had many folks share their warm… First I Was A Son
Two years ago this morning, my Dad passed away. To me, the date April 14th has now been redefined forever. As this date neared, and ultimately arrived, I have had many folks share their warm… First I Was A Son
Tomorrow is Father’s Day and I wanted to get this off of my mind before the actual day. Over the last couple of weeks this thought has been creeping into my psyche a little more often every day. Until these last few days, when it has downright bugged me, bothered me, and otherwise haunted me. I asked my wife yesterday, “What am I supposed to do on Father’s Day, with no father, for the first time in my life?”
I suppose I still don’t know the answer. But I know that I miss my Dad an awful lot.

I’m here in the yard, at the house I grew up in. I mowed the lawn as I usually do. But I’m missing my Dad. He’d be sitting right here, outside in the warm air.… Missing Dad
Dad, can we gather round the table one more time and just let loose?
Oh, we’d laugh til tears, you, my siblings, Mom, this boy you called moose.
I look at the hoop and wonder if I’ll ever see that arch ever again.
Dad, you were one the best lefty shooters there has ever been.
You weren’t well, but I never thought this day would come so soon.
Dimly, I thought that maybe when the day came, I’d be somehow immune.
Dad’s presence was felt, his impact impossible to miss. I don’t think he was looking down from heaven at us, because I am hoping he had better things to do, like lose himself in his mother’s waiting arms, or to look his Dad in the eye and hear the words, “Well done son”. Maybe he was off creating comedy from nothing with his twin sister June. Perhaps he was walking the streets of gold and getting to know his brother Roger, who passed away as a baby, before any of the other siblings.
See, me, and my generation, we hope to be measured one day in the same breath as the great people of the generation before us. In that generation the simplicity of life lived was the stunning portrayal choreographed by the depth found in the intricacies of magnificent minds with the perceived time to approach extraordinary. I am just a man, my Dad was a great man, a great man of God. His new place in heaven ensures what should always be, that I’ll look up to him. I do, and I will.
Somewhere around the world today there was another selfless soul born, of that I am pretty sure. And even with all the newborns today, there’ll never another Marjorie be.
I ended the phone call with …”my thoughts and prayers are with all of you.” As I promised I would, I dialed the number to my parents house and waited for Mom to answer. Usually, it’s been her making those dreaded calls to me, but tonight I had a message to pass on and an inkling that she already knew what I had just confirmed. She answered the phone and both of us seemed a bit scared to say the first words, knowing why each of us was on the line. I passed on the message I had promised to share and we talked about what we feared to be the case. Our dear, sweet Marjorie had passed, no more than an hour before.