Father's Day sucks for the kid whose father died when they were young. At least it did for me. While every other kid spent the day having fun playing with their dad or taking him out to dinner, I spent the day feeling sad and sorry for myself. I took down my shoebox stuffed with pictures of my dad and a few ancient artifacts including his stop watch, his wallet, his Navy gear, and his Land O Lakes cardboard cutout that he converted into a PG-13 gag. I also viewed the films in my mind of the handful of memories I had managed to collect and preserve before he died when I was six years old.
Today I went to visit my father's grave for the first time in about 4 years. Looking at his unassuming gravestone in a small cemetery, a shift was cemented in me today. As I said, I used to feel sorry for myself. This was because I didn't get to know my father much, and I never had a dad to be proud of me and to teach me man-stuff like discipline, responsibility, goal-setting, how to fight, how to treat a lady, how to shave, how to fix anything, etc. To this day I still struggle with a certain amount of insecurity and/or frustration with most of these things to varying degrees.
But as I said, there has been a turning point; I no longer feel sorry for myself. Perhaps it's because I have matured a bit, or perhaps because I am now a father myself. I don't know. I do know that I now feel sorry for my father. I feel sorry that he didn't have much of a chance to turn his life around (dying at age 26 doesn't leave much time for that). He never got to watch his son grow up, to hold his grand-kids, and all of the other blessings that come with age and maturity. There is a lot he never lived to see.
It hit me today that my Dad didn't live to see much because had little vision for life. Why else would someone take
a gun into a liquor store, rob it, and end up shot and killed? You do
that because you don't really see too many options in life.
After I left the grave today, I hung around the small town he spent most of his life. I drove by the house he grew up in. I went in the diner he worked at. I peered in the window of the tiny bar he drank at and once fell asleep playing bass guitar in a band. I saw the empty mills in the tiny town that have all closed down leaving little meaningful employment. And I saw the empty churches that nobody (or almost nobody) has gone into in decades; perhaps centuries. It was kind of depressing; hope and opportunity would be easy to miss there.
My Dad never had much of a chance . He had a cross on his tomb, but not Jesus in his heart (as far as I know). He had a father, but not one that taught him a lot of the things I longed to learn from him. I'm sure he must have some hopes and dreams, but I can't tell that he had a vision for life and goals to help make that become a reality.
I had no vision for life either, until I began a life-changing relationship with Jesus when I was close to the age my father died at. Prior to that, I was headed down the same dead-end trail my father and his father before him traveled. I wish to God my father had the same opportunity I did. I hear he was a great guy; both fun and funny, with a big heart. I wish I had a chance to have a relationship with him. And while I spent years in life sorrowful over all the things my father wasn't able to give me, I am thankful for the one thing he did give me; life. And I'm thankful for my Father in Heaven who gave me a second chance at life after I badly screwed it up the first time around.
Dad, I salute you. I wish I knew you. I hope you found your peace with God. If so, I can't wait to catch up with you in eternity.
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