Jesus and my Dad

My Dad grew up in a small rural town in Eastern Washington. He was the second son born to his parents and had 3 younger sisters. He was a middle child and was largely ignored by his parents. There are many stories I have heard about his growing up years that make me wonder how he ended up being the most Christ-like example I have ever met. But I can’t tell all those stories here - not enough time. 🙂

But what I CAN tell you is that he was an awesome Dad - especially suited to raise girls. Fortunately, he and my Mom had 2 adorable daughters and no sons.😉. I am the oldest daughter so my perspective is going to be a little different from that of my sister but we both agree that he was a great Dad. My Dad didn’t sit me down and explain how to live a godly life, he taught me by how he lived every day.

My Dad was 6 years older than my Mom. He was working at a service station that my Mom and her family used to frequent and that’s how they met. My Dad married my Mom against the wishes of his parents (especially his mother) so after they were married, my parents promptly moved out of their small town, ultimately ending up on the West side of the mountains. There were many unhealthy elements at play in both of their respective families so, in an effort to protect his wife and future children, my Dad opted to separate from the negative influence and move. This is something I didn’t understand growing up because my Dad protected us - he and our Mom didn’t tell us about any of the legitimate reasons they kept their distance from our extended family until we were adults. And, as a result, I had a great childhood and enjoyed my annual visits with grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins- innocently loving and accepting them as they were. Getting to know them through my own experiences that were not tainted by my parents’ past. This is one of the character traits I admire about my Dad. He walked away from people who didn’t have his best interests at heart (to say the least) but he didn’t expose the ugly details unless or until it either wasn’t a factor anymore or it was necessary to protect his family.

My parents tried to have children for 7 years and gave up. My Mom had to re-focus her goals and decided to be a career woman. She enrolled in a secretary school but then got pregnant! It was me arriving on the scene. 7 IS the number of perfection…😉. My sister arrived 2 years later to complete our family.

My Dad worked just 15 minutes from home for the first 10 or so years of my life but then changed jobs and had a 45 minute commute and later he was moved to a different office which was an hour and a half commute each direction for the last 5 or so years of his career. And he didn’t complain. In fact, he left home way early to avoid getting stuck in traffic and he ended up starting a side business associated with his company that helped them out of a jam and earned some extra income for our family. He worked hard. He took very few opportunities to rest when I was young but he was never too tired for me - never turned me away. In fact, my Mom knew he needed down time after work each day and she knew he would not refuse our attention so she would keep us away from him - telling us to leave him alone and let him read the newspaper while she was fixing dinner. After dinner, he was fair game! It wasn’t until after he retired that he cultivated hobbies like wood carving and toll painting. He rarely called in sick for work. I asked him about it once when he had a bad cold - I asked why he didn’t just stay home and rest. He told me he felt better when he was up and productive- staying in bed made his cold feel worse.

As a baby I was adorable😁 but colicky. My Dad used to get up with me in the night and rock me. Very little would soothe me apparently (sorry Mom and Dad!) but my Dad discovered that if he laid me on my tummy on a pillow on his lap and rocked me I would calm down and go to sleep. He called it the “silk pillow treatment” and it is a good metaphor for the treatment I ALWAYS received from my Dad.

I never saw my Dad angry. He disciplined us - I still remember the sting of a spanking from my Dad - but he never raised his voice (except to call us inside for dinner) and he never seemed to act rashly. Sometimes he spanked me for something I did while he was at work - so not in the heat of the moment. But even when it was immediate punishment, he didn’t seem angry and I don’t think he enjoyed punishing us (to be fair, I don’t think my Mom enjoyed it either). He had fashioned a thin stick for spanking that was kept on top of the refrigerator. It was primarily used by my Mom because she didn’t have the upper body strength to physically punish us effectively without assistance. But my Dad used his hand to spank us - he wanted to know how hard he was spanking, not wanting to cause physical damage but to hurt enough to teach the lesson about obedience. I never questioned his love for me. He was a master at loving correction. Once, as a teenager, when spanking was no longer appropriate and I had some autonomy, I was hanging out with friends at a next door neighbor’s house. It was summer and the windows were open. My Dad was working in the yard and he overheard our conversations. One of my friends used some bad language. When it was time to go home, I walked up the path to our front door and my Dad stood up from his yard work and said “You know, you don’t have to listen to that kind of language.” We talked briefly about it - no lecture, no forbidding me to spend time with those friends- just a reminder that I didn’t need to allow myself to be around people who use coarse language to express themselves. And it also reminded me that you never know who might be listening to your conversations so to keep my own language clean and pure. My Dad never used profanity and he didn’t participate in coarse joking.

When I was little, I was afraid of the dark - and so was my sister. My Dad was in charge of reading us bedtime stories, helping us get our teeth brushed and getting us tucked into bed. When we were REALLY little this also involved getting onto his hands and knees and crawling, with us on his back, giving us a “horsey back ride” to our rooms at the end of the hallway. Then both our parents would take turns praying with us - every night. We could then hear our Dad checking to make sure the front door was locked. Dad would leave the hall light on and our bedroom doors open and after checking the lock on the door, he would lay down on the floor in the hallway - staying there until we were fast asleep. We weren’t afraid as long as we could see our Dad keeping watch over us. I know my Dad took over this evening duty to give my Mom a break after a long day with us but I don’t think he viewed it as a chore. I think he genuinely enjoyed every moment of it - at least that’s the way he made us feel.

I used to have nightmares- even as a child. I would cry out in my sleep and I have memories of this dark shadow with a crew-cut picking me up out of my bed and putting me in bed with my parents and then later taking me back to my own bed. I came to realize later that the shadow was my Dad. But as a teenager my nightmares got worse - demonic in nature - definitely a spiritual attack. They often featured a shadow with a scary voice that was trying to kill me or drive me insane. I couldn’t sleep and I was afraid to go outside alone. My Dad never mocked me or made light of my nightmares. He knew I was afraid and so, every time I left the house when he was home he would walk me to my car. He made sure I felt safe.

We always went to church- to every available service or function. Our church was excellent at Christian community and fun family events that kept us connected with each other in a group of people that shared our convictions and supported each other. My parents also made a commitment to the Lord to send us to a private Christian school all the way through our entire education. It was a financial sacrifice and a strain on one income but they made it work and the Lord honored their commitment.

The kitchen was primarily my Mom’s domain but my Dad enjoyed getting in there from time to time - especially for special occasions. He used to bake cookies with me as his helper when I was young and he was in charge of the cooking on Thanksgiving and Christmas. When I was in late high school my Dad wanted to find a way to get closer to me as we had drifted so he came up with a plan to cook a new recipe with me one night a week. My Mom was banished from the kitchen and we took over once a week. That was so fun and we worked so well together. Working with my Dad - regardless of my age or location (garage or kitchen) was always a joy. He was inhumanly patient and had such a great sense of humor. When I think of him, I always picture him smiling or laughing.

After I moved out of the house I had many situations that I needed to be rescued from. And my Dad was there in a heartbeat every time I called. Once, I had gone to a seminar that ran late and had to fill my car up with fuel on my way home. It was late at night and it was dark and I accidentally locked my keys in the car. I tried to get a police officer who happened to be there to jimmy my lock but policies had changed and he couldn’t jimmy my car door open without proof the car was mine - and that proof was inside my locked car. This was before cell phones. So, I went to the pay phone outside the gas station and called and woke up my Dad who, without lecturing me or complaining about how he had to get up early for work the next day and how inconvenient it was for me to ask him to bail me out, he drove the 30 minutes to my location with the extra set of keys I gave my parents for emergencies. Every time I moved, my Dad helped me with his truck and burly muscles. My Dad was the strongest person I have ever met. He didn’t workout or lift weights but his natural physical strength was incredible and something I took for granted. Once I had gone to see a late-night movie with a friend and we had parked in different areas of the lot so we walked alone to our cars and my battery was dead. I had to find a pay phone outside the theater and call my Dad who again, without expressing any hesitation or displeasure, drove (in the snow this time) to the theater and rescued me. This happened countless times. He never failed to rescue me. My Dad was 100% reliable.

My Dad knew how to make the women in his life feel special and was generous to a fault. He called me his “Sweetie Pie” (called my sister that too - we were his “sweetie pies”). Every year on Valentine’s Day he would get my Mom a dozen roses and jewelry and would get my sister and I each a single red rose and candy or a necklace. Even the first year after I was married he had a bouquet of flowers sent to me in New Mexico on Valentine’s Day. And when our daughter was born and we knew I was going to have to go back to work after my maternity leave, my Dad volunteered to babysit her during the week while I was working which he and my Mom did for 2 1/2 years until our son was born and I stopped working.

My Dad was far from perfect. But he was the perfect Dad for me. I saw him give and give and give - time, resources, hard work. When my husband’s father passed away, my Dad came to our house while I was at work with a cup of coffee in his hand for my husband and sat and just listened to my husband’s heart.

When his own mother developed Alzheimer’s, he drove over to the town he grew up in to help one of his sisters make arrangements for her care. He had power of attorney for his Mom and when he met up with his sister he said “Well, Mom never took very good care of us. But I guess now it’s time for us to take care of her.” And they did. My Dad was never one to hold a grudge.

My Dad read his Bible but I don’t remember him ever teaching me scriptural lessons verbally. I remember theological discussions with my Mom but my Dad taught me scriptural principles by living them. As I said, my Dad had his faults, but he showed me Jesus every day and the closer I get to the Lord, the more I appreciate my Dad for introducing me to Him.