Father's Day

So a week ago my dad asked me what was up with my blog. No new entries in a while, you can see. I told him I just hadn't been inspired to write lately. Well, while trying to think of what to send my dad for Father's Day coming up, I got an idea, which was inspired by my dad.

My dad is a good guy. He's the type of person people just like--easy-going, easy to laugh, hard working, and respectable. My dad was a quiet presence in my life. He barely ever raised his voice at my brother and I, but we loathed to disappoint him. I mainly remember him chuckling at our antics. He was the voice of reason, calm in the face of raging sibling rivalry or pre-teen angst. Solid evidence of his pervasive level-headedness is in one of my vivid memories of my dad.

Dad taught me how to drive. We sat in his prized little tan Chevy S10 pick-up while he prepped me for how to balance the transition from clutch to gas. After learning how to ease from 1st to 2nd gears in a big empty parking lot, he told me to take it out onto the road. The actual road. I balked at first, but my excitement to drive quickly pushed me to go for it. It all went pretty well at first. I don't know if it was that first trip out or a subsequent one, but at some point I had to make a left turn. I badly judged how much I needed to turn the wheel, veered into the oncoming lane, and headed straight for an oncoming car. Now, most people would correct the wheel to the right and wave a chagrined appology to the terrified other driver. I wasn't sensible. As a matter of fact, I was so panicked that I lost all sensibility whatsoever and began to maniacally laugh my head off as I frozenly continued to careen straight of the other car. My dad did yell for me to turn the wheel, but as I was frozen in some kind of freak-out laughing fit, I didn't. So he reached over and turned the wheel for me, thereby saving all of our lives. We were next to a church parking lot and he directed me to pull in there. I did and stopped the car finally. We both sat there in stunned silence a minute...Then dad said simply, "We won't tell your mother about this." Ha ha! I still laugh at that memory (while cringing, of course). But the poor man did continue to take me out and continue my badly needed driver's education.

My dad exposed me to "roughing it" on a week-long hiking and camping trip to Michigan at Picture Rock. I came back filthy and so glad to be home, but the memories I have of fishing and wading in the creek, catching my first fish (and impaling a poor guppy through the head with my hook), and singing "The Ants Go Marching In" with my Aunt Becky while hiking in the rain are still with me and are some of my favorite childhood memories.

It was my dad who taught me to ride my bike while swearing he wouldn't let go of my big ol' plastic pink bike seat--but he did! I used this same sneaky strategy while teaching Aiden to ride.

He laughed everytime I screamed at the sight of a spider and then exasperatedly got rid of it for me so I'd stop screaming.

He embarrassed me when he drove me and my brother to school in his beat-up old blue classic (Chevy Nova?). But looking back now, it was probably cool.

He kept me in line when I pushed the limits of my independence too early, standing outside in his boxers (it was dark) to take my keys after I'd stayed out too late with the car. And surely, we know he had reason to worry.

He was pretty tough at my weddign when he walked me down the aisle towards the man who would continue keeping me safe from spiders (and do most of the driving)--but he wasn't completely. But he could be confident that he'd done the best he could to keep me safe and happy and to show me the kind of person I needed to expect to have as a future husband.

I just want to say thanks to my dad for always remaining a constant in my life. I've received unconditional love and support from him and even though I'm far and am a harried wife and mother, I still think of him often. Taylor Swift wrote a song, The Best Day, that really brings back the feeling I had as a child when nothing was irreparable and everything was colored by a perfect childhood naivete: It's the age of princesses and pirate ships and the seven dwarfs, And daddy's smart and you're the prettiest lady in the whole wide world, And now I know why all the trees change in the fall, I know you were on my side even when I was wrong, And I love you for giving me your eyes, for staying back and watching me shine, And I didn't know if you knew, So I'm taking this chance to say, that I had the best day with you today...