Happy Father's Day

I was encouraged and inspired by my friend and amazing fellow blogger, Patricia, to write this post. After I read her blog called "My Daddy's Dash", I thought that I would like to share some thoughts about my amazing pappy! "The Dash" is a poem by Linda Ellis, it talks about the dash between dates of people's life and death, the dash represents what they did and who they were in between those dates. There is more to it, you really need to see the poem to really get it. It's a great poem. You can go to thedashmovie.com to see it. So, I want to honor my dad by sharing some of who he was. Some may have heard or may already know some of these things, but there may be some things you haven't heard, or there may be some of you that don't know any of this, so let me share about those years in between -the dash for him.

My dad along with his twin sister, Zora were the youngest of twelve children. He had an interesting childhood as he lost his mother when he was just two years old and his father when he was twelve. He would often tell the story of how his dad would make them go find a switch from a tree in the yard and each time they were spanked, after each hit they had to say, "Thank you, papa, a thousand times". He also lost his twin sister when they were twelve. She had tonsillitis- having that back in the 40's and down south, she ended up with an infection which took her life. He was raised by his older sisters.

He enjoyed sports as a boy, one of his favorites being baseball. I didn't find out until his funeral from an old friend of his that he was really good at baseball. This friend said he could have been a professional baseball player, but that was difficult for him down south in the 50's. As he got older he loved bowling and we have many trophies around the house to prove it!

He served in the United States Army, and was stationed in Germany. He taught me the few German words he learned, (I'm sure I'm not going to spell them correctly, sorry), such as ein, zwi, dri, fia, ich liebedich, wegates, auf wiedersane. We actually had a whole routine that we would do before I went to bed at night. He would say goodnight, I would repeat, ein, zwi, dri, fea, I would repeat, ich liebedich, repeat, vegates, repeat, auf wiedersane, repeat, goodnight, repeat, I love you, repeat. Then it was finally off to bed. That is a fun memory for me. He would also call me his Pooky-Pooky Poo. :)


He was one of the hardest workers I know. He was a cook at Cigna Insurance Company for 30 years. He never missed a day in all of that time. People at work loved his soups and his macaroni and cheese. Sadly, I wasn't a big soup person when I was younger, and I don't think I ever tasted his macaroni and cheese. Of course he wouldn't cook much at home since that's what he was doing all day. Plus mom was a home daycare provider, so since she was home she would fix dinner. I did get to experience his cooking once in a while, when mom was at ladies' seminars and things. He liked to use spices and do things that were a little different, but were always good. I remember one morning when mom was away, he cut glazed doughnuts in half put them in a pan and cut small pieces of cheese to go on the doughnut halves, it was so good! He was the kind of man who retired, then went back to work for awhile again.

He was the strongest man I knew. I loved to have him show off his muscles to my friends. Then I also loved to have him show how he could swing me on one arm. I would just hold on to that big muscle and he would swing me back and forth. Even though he was so strong, killing my bugs for me and making me always feel safe, there were a couple of things that were strong fears for him. My dad did not like to drive over bridges with water underneath, he wouldn't drive if we were going some distance because he did not want to have to drive over bridges. He didn't like water, even though he was on a ship in the service. His other big fear was.......cats! Yes, you heard right, he did NOT like cats at all! (He didn't care for dogs either, not an animal person). I'll never forget the story my uncles told of my dad being in a car when he was younger down south, the car had windows that didn't roll all the way down in the back. Somehow, I don't remember exactly how, but a cat got in that car. They said that my dad scrambled out of that half open window faster than they could have ever imagined! I remember one day here we had a stray cat that came on our back porch. I have always loved animals, so I begged my mom to feed it, but she told me I better not even think about feeding it, because my dad didn't like them and would not be happy(she didn't like them either). So, sadly I didn't get to feed it, but it just stayed on the porch. When dad got home from work he was busy reading something. I came to the door and said, "Dad, look we have a visitor." He looked up saw the cute, sweet, little kitten, then stepped backward down 3 steps in one leap, and ran around to the front of the house and came in that door. He banged on the back door to try to get it to leave. Once it did, he put pepper all over the back porch to make sure it didn't come back...it never did.

He was a strong man, but was also very stubborn. He didn't want to have anything to do with church. My mom was saved and started taking me to church with her, he wasn't a fan of that. There were some pretty rough moments during those times. But mom prayed faithfully every day for twelve years for him to be saved. One day when we were having a dedication service for our new church building he came and was saved. What a blessing! After that point, he was in church every time the doors were opened. He would greet people when they came in, give them that beautiful smile and a bulletin. He was on the deacon board, and was an usher, and helped count the money. He worked as hard and faithfully at church as he did at his job.

He had many friends, made people laugh, and always looked and acted younger than his years. He loved food, especially fish, black eyed peas, and collard greens. He loved sucking on the neckbones! Leukemia and diabetes changed those things in my dad, sadly. He wasn't able to be that same strong man that I always knew growing up, but he always kept up an amazing sense of humor and kept himself and others laughing, and what a great laugh it was by the way. He loved Red Sox baseball, loved watching basketball with me, and other sports as well. But he definitely loved watching bowling on TV. Sometimes Sunday dinners would be interrupted or a little shorter as he had to finish watching his bowling. There are so many things that I could say and share, but I think you get the idea of who he was. So many memories and so much life in that little dash, but it didn't seem enough for me. My heart feels like he was taken too soon, but I know that this was the life and those were the years the Lord had for him. I am just so thankful for those years that we had together, all the memories in that dash.
Lord, thank you for my wonderful, amazing, pappy. I love him and miss him so much. This was a tough day without him, but thank you for this opportunity to share some of the memories of his life. Please give him a hug for me, tell him his "Little Buddy Jr." says Happy Father's Day, and that she loves him very much! Tell him I can't wait to see him again soon! Thank you, Lord for being my Heavenly Father who loves me more than even my pappy did. Love you, Lord. Happy Father's Day!