Today is my Dad's birthday. This picture was taken almost 5 years ago. I guess its time to get an updated picture of me and Dad. If any of you know my dad, saying that he is a quiet man is incorrect. He may be "soft spoken" and a "man of few words" but his actions always speak a thousand words.
I always enjoyed watching my dad watch M*A*S*H* reruns. He would sit in his chair and I wouldn't even know he was laughing until I looked over and saw him smiling while his whole upper body would bounce. He was always independent as I was growing up going about his day doing his thing. He worked at home a majority of the time, so he would get up early and do some work, eat some oatmeal, have some tea and get on with his day. He was usually the one driving us all over to sports practice, play practice or piano lessons. Just to come home, make dinner and stay up late at night working depending on what he needed to finish. He rarely asked us to help him. It was probably easier to just do it himself than to fight and argue trying to get us to do anything.
As I've grown up and started having adult responsibilities, I often regret not paying more attention to the things Dad did. He always had a pretty large garden and I never once helped him plant, weed or maintain the garden. I remember him canning, freezing and pickeling vegetables at the end of the summer. Can I tell you how he did it? Nope. I just remember husking the corn and cutting the corn off the cob. Somehow it involved a pressure cooker to can. He wouldn't have needed to say anything, if I had just watched him more clostly, I would know how to do it to this day.
Dad always has a creative way to get a point across. We kids were always leaving things on the floor. One time I remember Dad asking who picked up a quarter that had been on the floor. I don't remember who 'fessed up. But he asked why they didn't pick up the empty pop can that was next to the quarter. My dad had purposely placed the quarter there trying to prove the point that if someone was going to bother bending over to pick up a quarter, it shouldn't be any more difficult to pick up the pop can as well. I still think about that today as I'm tidying up.
The road we grew up on had horrible pavement with pot holes for a good mile. You couldn't drive on the road without hitting a million potholes. After a mile the pavement turned into gravel. There was a road sign at the end that warned drivers "Pavement Ends." My dad painted a sign and hung it below the sign that said "Thank God" Eventually they fixed the road.
Then recently, Sears did something to really disappoint Dad. He's been a faithful customer for years and when this issue happened, Sears wouldn't do anything to "make it right" or apologize. So he not only cut up his Sears credit card, he mailed it to them.
Happy Birthday, Dad!
5 comments:
Beautiful, Angi. Now you know why you kids turned out so well. I always said that to have such good kids, you needed to have the right dad. Aren't we all blessed. Thanks. M
I just looked at the date on this entry! It says May 15, that is Aunt Tami's birthday. Your dad's is the 17. The computer must have had a breakdown when your sister had it!.
No, I started writing it on the 15th and forgot to change the date when I actually posted it. I know his birthday is the 17th.
That is awesome Angi. It is so true, Dad does have such a wonderful way with actions and lessons. However, I still remember the day all 5 of us made him so frustrated that he lined us all up for a spanking. I think Jaci was 16 at the time :)
Right. I also remember that. But I can't remember how old we were. The spanking wasn't what hurt, it was the embarassment that I was getting spanked in the first place.
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