Dad

Thinking about you today ---

That verse you would often quote "I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength" from Phillipians 4.

As a kid I didn't see that you were living it out every day.  I didn't stop to think about the challenges of getting up and working long days at Shell with diminished energy -- climbing those four flights of stairs with braces on your legs or the many falls you took.

You wanted so much more for us -- exposing us to Christian education at a young age and challenging us to go to college.  How did you manage the debt of 3 kids in private college?  Money was always tight at our house. 

You set an example for the type of man I was looking for in a husband.

The day of my wedding, you cleaned the huge front glass doors of the church building -- I got my dislike for smudged windows from you.

You always quoted your mom, "Beauty is as beauty does."  to keep me from becoming vain. You wanted me to be kind and loving -- even when I went through the difficult "catty" stages with my friends.  I remember your concern over my tom-boy stages and your lessons on how to sit like a lady.

In your quiet way you coped with being hooked to a respirator for 11+ years, totally depending on Mom to be your legs, and strength.  You went all those years being fed with a feeding tube-- how hard it was to have family dinners, knowing you were back there in your room unable to join us.

I told Terry the other day that when the kids and I would come for a week in mid-July every year, you would start praying for a break in the weather - so that I wouldn't have to be on that 10-hr trip up I-44 in triple digit numbers.  God always brought in a cool front.

You were never voted "Man of the Year" in any magazine or publication -- but so many people whose lives you touched still tell me today what your committed life taught them. 

I KNOW THE IMPRINT YOU HAVE LEFT ON MY LIFE.