Posted by
The Hermit Crab on Friday, February 11, 2011 9:36:36 PM
I told a slight fib in my profile on this website. I said that John Quincy Adams is my hero (or role model). Actually, that's not true. My real hero and role model died yesterday, at 8:25 PM. He was my father, and he was doubtless the finest man I have ever met in my 51 years. I don't expect to meet a better in whatever years I have left.
I deliberately chose the word "fine" instead of "great", because I believe that Dad would have rejected the word "great". Nonetheless, he lived and died the hero of all three of his sons, and leaves behind a fairly large and entirely despondent family who now has to figure out how to get along without our wise and beloved leader. Most of all, he leaves behind a loving wife and the greatest love story his offspring have ever known. (Their granddaughter Michelle said someone should make a movie about them. She's right.)
My father didn't give up life easily. It took one heart attack and four different cancers to do him in, and even then he made it to 83. He looked like a lovable father and grandpa, which he was, but anyone who thought of him as just that and no more was badly deceived. He had steel in his spine, and had a very sharp and brutally honest mind. He never deceived himself, which is a species of honesty not often encountered. It's one that I have labored at for years, but have yet to master.
I want desperately to write something to try to explain to a reader who doesn't already know Papa how great he was. (Wow, it hurts to even write of him in the past tense.) I know that I'm not equal to the challenge, but I owe it to the Old Man (a term of great respect in my family). I guess I'll have to settle for jotting down notes about who he was and what we've lost.
Next time: Lessons My Father Taught Me (Sometimes Intentionally)