Father's Day

Yesterday was Father's Day.  We got to go up to my mom and dad's in Henry on Saturday to celebrate. I got an awesome present for Dad, which did not come in the mail until today so I still can't mention what it is, but I know he will love it.

Its hard for me to pick from all of the good memories I have of my dad, but he has always been one of my very favorite people in the whole world. I was lucky enough to grow up with a dad that was just a big kid. We played all the time. ALL. THE. TIME. I have a lot of old videos from when I was growing up that really show what a fun time we had, but one of my very earliest memories of Dad is when he would walk me up to the car dealership by our house growing up. He would either carry me, or I would ride my big wheel, but when we got there I always wanted to get in the back of the trucks. It wouldn't have mattered if there were three trucks or thirty, I wanted to get in the back of every single one. I am sure that probably annoyed my dad, but I never knew it. He would patiently lift me from truck bed to truck bed until we had seen them all.

On nights when my mom worked Dad and I would crank up music videos way louder than Mom liked when she was home. Or sometimes we would make the trip to Chillicothe to see a movie. We saw all of the 90's Disney movies that way.  Alissa didn't come along until I was almost nine, so my dad was my best playmate. He played blocks with me tirelessly. We had this game where we would build roads for toy cars with the blocks and then when it was time to put them away, we would pick a color and race to pick up all of that color of block and dad would always hide one and we would fight for the last one. Every time. Or hide and seek where I hid in the same spot in the closet every time and Dad would pretend not to know where I was and look for me for ten minutes with my anticipation growing every minute that he would find me. Or when he pretended to be a Velociraptor and broke his toe jumping onto the coffee table. All of these games ended in serious tickle fights until I couldn't breathe. Except the dinosaur incident...that ended with Dad rolling on the floor trying not to shout expletives and with tears in his eyes.  And when I got a little older and had girlfriends over Dad made a habit of scaring the absolute daylights out of us at every opportunity. We always knew it was coming. We would be swimming in the pool, or coming back from a bikeride, and he was out there, in the dark, waiting for the perfect moment to spring out and send us screaming into the house where my mom would laugh because he used to do the same thing to her.

My love of science fiction and good music came from my dad. To this day if I need a quick attitude adjustment I just blare some ELO, Hall & Oates, or Bowie. That will always take me right back to lazy Saturdays with my dad.  We loved shows like Quantum Leap and cried together during the series finale when we realized Sam never made it home. And when X-files came out, Dad and I would watch it every Friday night.  He introduced me to authors like Ray Bradbury and J.R.R. Tolkien whose books got me through those horrible junior high years when I felt like I couldn't relate to anyone. I loved talking about The Lord of the Rings series with my dad. I remember many times when I would be awake late into the night reading and I couldn't stop myself from creeping into my parents room to wake dad up and tell him about which exciting part I was at. He would come out and sit with me at the kitchen table and talk about it with me, even though he was tired and had to get up early for work.

Or those times even after I graduated from high school when I would see a twenty dollar bill on my dresser because my dad said "you should always have a little cash on you." Even last week, I was making popcorn on the stove and had a memory of my dad doing that with me. I thought it was so neat, and it does taste much better that way.

I am so grateful that I still have my dad with me. I am grateful every single day for the love and sacrifice of both of my parents. I know I don't have kids yet, but the older I get, the more I come to understand just how much they love me. My dad says a lot that he wishes I was little again because he feels like he didn't do enough for me, but I am just tearing up as I write this because from my little girl perspective, I had the very best Daddy in the known universe. I couldn't have asked for a better man to raise me, and I couldn't ask for a better friend today.

I am proud to be your daughter and prouder to call you Dad. I love you.