Father’s Day

“What do you want to do for Father’s Day?” Michelle asked.

“Nothing,” I replied

This is my sixth year as a Father, but I don’t see Father’s Day as a day for me. It still feels like it’s supposed to be a day for my dad, and I haven’t been able to spend it with him for the last eight years.

I remember spending the week before his funeral at my parents’ house with Amy and Scott. Mom asked all three of us to speak at his funeral, and we spent many hours that week remembering and telling stories about our Dad. The hardest part about speaking at his funeral was knowing that we would have to leave out some of the best stories. If we took the time to tell all the great stories about him, we would still be talking. The man gave us endless material.

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I didn’t share the following story that day, and I’ve always regretted it because it reveals so much about his character.

My dad was committed. When he invested in something, it was all or nothing. Our family and our church were his two biggest commitments. Every spring our church would have Service Day where the congregation would gather on a Saturday morning and spend all day doing various projects – repairs, landscaping, painting, or whatever was needed to preserve and beautify the campus.

It was the one day every year when the rest of the world got to experience my dad’s daredevil acts. He would always volunteer for the job that everyone else was too scared to do. One year, after I had finished a project, I walked around the corner to see a group of people standing in a semicircle with their gazes fixed to the sky. I looked up to match their gazes and saw my three-hundred-pound father thirty feet up in a tree trimming branches with a chainsaw.

As I approached the group, my friend Jeff saw me and said, “That was awesome. I don’t think a monkey could’ve climbed that tree any faster.” To them, they were witnessing something amazing. To me, I was just experiencing a typical Saturday with my Dad.

One year, Dad was flying back from a business trip on the day before Service Day. Due to a series of flight delays and cancellations, my Dad had to spend the night in an airport. His flight didn’t land until 6:00 am on Service Day. I picked him up at the airport that morning, and he said, “I didn’t get to eat breakfast, and I’m starving. Do you want to get something to eat?”

So, Dad and I went to Joe’s Coffee Shop where he ordered his standard steak and eggs. As we got in the car to go home, Dad said, “Let’s go straight to the church.”

“Dad, you just pulled an all-nighter in an airport. Everyone will understand if you don’t make it today.”

“That doesn’t matter,” he replied. “I said I was going to be there, and I’m going to be there.”

And that was my dad. He worked the entire day at the church with no sleep because he said he would be there.

I cannot think of a single instance in his life when he didn’t keep his word, even when it would’ve made sense not to.

Happy Father’s Day, Dad.