To Daddy

When people ask me who my father was, what shall I tell them? What is the essence of the man, the defining quality for which he will be remembered? My father was a teacher. From the simple lessons of childhood to the wonders of this universe we live in, he taught, he shared, he made real and wonderful all the knowledge he possessed, always eager to pass it on. He taught me how to appreciate the life in a giant tree, or tiny crawling insect, how to see the weight, and the lightness, in the tortuous thrust of a mountain, reaching ponderously for the sky. He bought me a telescope and introduced me to our moon, the planets and a sky full of stars, awakening a hunger that hasn't and can not die. Even at the end, when the disease had all but torn the now frail life from him, but he had one last lesson to share. When I was 19 I painted a picture of a unicorn on a hill, it was watching a woman catching sunlight on a large broadsword. I took this to my father... he gruffly told me he didn't have time for any "middle earth" stuff. When I last saw my father I held him and he, haltingly, fighting, the ravages of his cancers, told me ... "You used to bring pictures to me" "You brought me gardens and forests and unicorns..." "Each picture was better than the one before it.. so sometimes... I got impatient... I brushed off the picture you held, anxious to see the next..." "Then they stopped..." He rested for a while and I held him.... then he whispered, " I never meant to kill the unicorns.." I held him close, and we both cried. I told him that he didn't kill the unicorns, that only my own fear held them back, and I promised him that there would be unicorns again. The next day, just before Mary and I left to go home, I held him close again and I whispered to him, "Daddy, you have always been my hero, I love you." I never saw him alive again, but he will be with me always. His strength, his wisdom and his love have shaped my life. I can only pray that some of it has rubbed off as I follow his journey with my own children. Goodbye daddy, rest well in your bay....Ok.. so it isn't a poem ... Kathy's tribute to her kitty prompted me to post this. This is the eulogy I wrote for my father when we buried him in the Cheasapeak bay last summer. Written February 11th, 2002 © on Feb 11 2002 05:55 AM PST   18 • 0 • 10