Number 20

I am thankful for my Dad.  Our time together was cut painfully short, but I am so thankful for the 19 years I did have with him.

My Dad was my biggest fan, which I know isn't all that uncommon for a daughter, but he truly thought I was the prettiest, smartest, and funniest gal around.  There was however that span of time during the early teen years when he probably thought I was the biggest pain in the butt around. . .

He taught me lots of important life lessons- like how to stand up for myself, how it's important to make good grades, and to never settle for mediocrity.  He also taught me about how cool The Doors, Janis Joplin, and Led Zeppelin were.  He tried to convince me how cool El Camino cars were, but I never did quite agree with him on that.

I remember once in preschool, there was a little girl that was being mean to me and I, being meek and timid, would just deal with it and cry about it later.  My Dad kept telling me to "bloody her nose".  Not wanting to see blood and cause a mess (much too frightening for a 4 year old), I finally got her down on the floor one day, straddled her so she couldn't get away, and covered her entire face with a Sharpie.  Like a not-at-all-washable-good-luck-EVER-getting-that-off-your-face Sharpie.  Her Mom was really mad about it and the teacher had to talk to my parents about it but I didn't get in trouble at home because my Dad knew that I was finally standing up for myself.  And he thought it was funny.

Cara and I often joke about how we make fun of other people's misfortune.  I know that sounds horribly mean- but I'm talking about the stuff you might see on America's Funniest Home Videos.  Like the time she got bucked off a horse and broke her tailbone?  That was seriously funny.  But probably not to her at the time.  Now she agrees it was hysterical.  I think I get my sense of humor from my Dad.  He would do things like tie my shoe laces together in about 30 knots and laugh when I found them and had to sit there untying each one.  I remember getting in trouble a couple times for laughing when Collen got a spanking.  Mom said I was being mean and cruel.  But I bet if Dad had ever watched my aunt Deloris get a spanking, he would have laughed too.

My Dad did stuff that was totally embarrassing like crushing boy's hands during a handshake.  Or like when he was sitting on the front porch with a shotgun, in the dark, when we pulled up coming home from a date- I never got a call back from that guy.  Can't imagine why.

He also did things that were probably a little embarrassing for him, but he did them anyway, just because it was special to me- like when I was on the dance team in college and during homecoming, we all brought our dads on the field to dance a routine with us.  He even had a tee shirt that said TTU Dancing Dad.  At first he refused to wear it or take part at all, but he later relented, ended up having a great time, and even later wore the tee shirt regularly.  One of the last pictures I have with my dad, he is wearing that shirt.

Sometimes I start to throw myself a pity party because it doesn't seem fair that he missed so much:  seeing me graduate from college, walking me down the aisle, meeting his granddaughter, getting to just talk on the phone to each other; I could go on and on.  But then I remember that I'm lucky I have so many amazing memories with him.  And some people lose a parent much younger than I did (like Collen, who was only 13) or grow up never having one of their parents around.  There is always someone who is worse off.  So, because of that, I always cancel the pity party and think about how thankful I am to have had my sweet Dad as long as I did.  He was a really cool dude.