My father stormed into the house one day exclaiming to his wife and four daughters, “LET’S GET SOME PRECISION IN OUR DAILY LIVING!” He was exasperated, even raised his voice a little, which was not his style. Who knows what we did to deserve it, but we all started pressing our lips together in an effort not to laugh. You know how puffs of air start coming out of your nose when you can’t let a serious rupture of laughter come out? Well a lot of that was happening in the room.
Now, (for safety’s sake) we generally did not laugh at our father. But, this came so far out of the blue, it was a shock. We snuck looks at each other, all of us trying to keep it together. My dad was an engineer—precise, cerebral, left brained all the way. But God gave him a family full of right brained women for whom his brand of precision was not even on the radar. In our defense, because of this, he enjoyed a level of laughter and mischief, along with beauty and spontaneity that he never would have had if surrounded by people like himself.
He was a full blooded German, and we used to have a book of German humor with blank pages…you get it. But generally, he was our quiet, thoughtful leader. He built things. A bridge one summer, a barn the next, then a swimming pool—all mostly by himself. The only help he had was from his girls, pressed into service, we carried boards, fetched screwdrivers, and held things. There was a lot of holding things…steady.
Father’s Day was a few days ago…I would have liked to call him and wish him a Happy Father’s Day, but if there are phones in heaven, I have no idea what the area code might be. I heard that there are more collect telephone calls made on Father’s Day than on any other day of the year, but none of those calls are made to the dads who have passed.
Sometimes however, they do seem to call us. This happened to another Nancy who lost her dad. When her father died unexpectedly at age 78, the family was heartbroken. During the funeral, her sister felt her phone vibrate in her purse and ignored it, but the caller left a message which she later retrieved. It was a man’s voice and it said, “Hi, this is dad, I just wanted to let you know I made it home.”
The caller obviously had mistakenly called the wrong number, but the message was clear to all. Their dad had completed his journey. Some mistakes are not mistakes at all.
Families are so precious. Love. Forgive. Make contact. Start over. If you didn’t do that on Father’s Day, it is not too late. Any day will do.
To all the great dads out there, I hope your special day was great. And Dad, if you can read this, I love you.
Nancy
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