It had been a long, up-hill battle with a failing body. It was a battle that not only ultimately claimed his life, but many aspects of his personality and ability to have the vigor for life he once possessed.
It is amazing how I had forgotten how fun he was until after he was gone. For years he had become so weak and merely a shell of himself physically, emotionally, and mentally. This change was dramatic enough that I often felt like I didn't know the man he had become. I resented his uneven keel, even though it was due to the plethora of medication he was on. Not to mention the sheer amount of physical turmoil he endured at the hand of his kidneys failing him. Upon his passing, as I gathered pictures, videos, and trinkets from a life stolen by disease, I was able to realize and remember the man for what he was, and not what he had become.
My dad was my football coach. and my basketball coach. and my baseball coach. He was the man that taught me to call the Hogs and ride a bike. He was the dad all the other kids were jealous of for one reason or another, whether it was trying to catch air in his old pickup truck on the way home from practice or letting us sneak cookies when mom wasn't looking. His knees were what I held on to as a toddler watching Predator for the first time. His hands and beard rough from a week's worth of hard labor at the rice mill, yet gentle enough to take us for rides on his motorcycle when we asked. He took us camping, whether we wanted to go or not and instilled in me a love and appreciation of good music. He was the life of the party whatever the occasion. He was fun and cool and lively. Sure his brand of parenting was a little unorthodox and he's most likely be locked up now-in-days for taking me to R-rated action movies as a father-son bonding experience every month or for spending hours wrestling with me as I continued to come back for more until I was seriously injured, crying, and he was in trouble by way of mom. We even got our first tattoos together.
I distinctly remember dad teaching me how to swim at the local Y by throwing me in the pool and forcing me to either swim or drown trying. It was with the same sentiment that he left. He died the day before my 24th birthday. This forced me to spend a day that would normally be spent celebrating with friends and family diving into another aspect of the real world. There came with it a sense that "nothing in this life is free and nothing worth having is easy". He never said it but spoke in both of these instances saying "the world isn't going to cater to you or be given to you easily". For that, I am thankful.
It would have been nice to have had more time with him, but some things aren't meant to be. Hindsight is often 20/20. It would have been nice to say what I didn't enough and do what we had always put off but when I think of those things I remember, and am thankful for, the things I was given. Just the week before he passed away, during a time when we had not had an actual conversation in weeks if not months, we went to the feed store to get dog food. As we pulled out of the store's parking lot my dad looked at me and said "I'm proud of you son". I didn't respond, much to my regret, but instead quietly excepted his comment and carried on. It was that little sentence that God used, in His perfect timing, to give me a lasting memory of the man I remember growing up with, the man that I remember as my dad.
...and man could he ever tell a story.
So, if you've got him, whether you're on great terms or not, enjoy him for being the man God has placed in your life.
peace.
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