Friday, July 28, 2017

Daddy's Little Girl

Monday marked seven years since Daddy passed. One day I will write about how that has affected my life, but today is not that day. Instead, I'd like to share something I wrote for my dad's memorial service all those years ago. I knew I would never make it through myself, so I had the pastor read it for me. It is shared here in its entirety:



In honor of my Dad’s love for Dave Letterman and his Top Ten Lists, these are my “Top 5 Things I Will Remember Most About My Dad.”

5. When I was in primary school, Dad used to be off of work one day during the week. On those days, he would pick me up from school instead of me going to daycare. We would always go and get purple and orange slushies and sometimes we would get stale bread or crackers and go feed the seagulls on the beach.

4. Everyone knows my Dad’s love for trivia and pop culture. What you might not know is that he passed that down to me. When I lived at home, we would always watch all the awards shows and comment about performances and winners. When I moved out, I could count on a phone call at some point during a big awards show, usually saying something to the effect of “What were they thinking?!” I must say though, that, growing up, I helped him add to his trivia vault exponentially by cluing him in to all the teenybopper information on music and movies.

3. My Dad used to come read to my class at school when I was younger. My friends and teachers were always so excited because Dad would read everything in character. No boring monotone from him. Every character had a different voice. And I thought I had the coolest dad because of it. Because of his work shift, he would also often go on field trips with my class, the greatest of which was our 5th grade experience in Washington DC.

2. Dad never met a stranger. When I was a teenager, this brought me much embarrassment. “Do you have to talk to everybody?” I would ask him as we went from grocery store, to restaurant, to gas station. As an adult, it allows me to see how many connections and ways you can brighten a person’s day, just by having a couple minute conversation with them.

1. In recent years, almost every time my dad and I talked on the phone, at the end of the conversation he would almost always tell me how proud he was of me. It didn’t matter what we had been talking about, he would end with “I’m proud of you.”

And so I leave it at that, and would like to turn it around on him. I can say that I am proud to have a father whom so many cherished and cared about. Thank you all for being there for him.