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What Better Father Figure Than My Dad?

Happy Father's Day to all you father's out there!

By A. MarlerPublished 2 years ago Updated 2 years ago 4 min read
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November 2021- My parents with me and my boys

My dad is the coolest day.

How many people can say that their dad pretended to sing and play guitar as Barry Gibb from The Bee Gees while their mom fan-girled in the crowd?

I know it doesn't sound as incredibly epic to then say that he was the teacher for the 5th and 6th graders and was the final act, along with the principal and the music teacher, for the school's talent show, but believe me, it was! Not many kids born in the 90s would appreciate The Bee Gees. In fact, I don't think my dad would have even considered doing one of their songs as an "act" if it weren't for my mom. Still, it was worth it to make the hour drive to the school for the performance. It didn't matter that they weren't actually playing or singing. It was like we were at an actual concert and the kids were going crazy! If we had all gotten our way, they would have performed the entire album, gone well into the night, before anyone tired and had to leave. Needless to say, us girls were so proud to see our daddy up there.

That's the thing with our dad, he can do anything.

I remember having to do science fair projects for school. The first two out of the three I ever did were the most memorable. In the first, I was able to incorporate my love of roly-polies and figure out what kind of environment they prefer. I had no clue what a hypothesis was or how to put my board together, but my dad helped me get through it all.

When the second project came around, we had chicken wings for dinner so we could use the bones to put the wing together for the board. Once everything was done, I understood how birds could fly. It was a great learning experience and earned (really both of us) first place at the fair.

That's one thing that I hadn't really recognized so much then as I do now. My dad has a lot of patience. I don't ever remember feeling rushed or dumb in any way. In fact, learning didn't seem like such a chore. I guess that's why he chose teaching as a profession!

Besides education, he was also patient with driving. He taught me to ride a bike and to drive a car. I learned both stick shift and automatic. Learning stick shift was extra fun in the $400 1970 Volkswagen he bought me. It wasn't just stick shift, it was a use-all-your-muscle-and-hope-it-went-to-the-right-gear-kind of shift. Needless to say, driving that car was a joy.

Thankfully we didn't take the Volkswagen on our long road trip from California to Utah.

My best friend from high school needed to get back to Utah for school and we agreed to drive him there. Since this was before iPods or Bluetooth, we really only had the radio and two CDs to entertain us. I hadn't thought about how boring it would be to listen to the two CDs that entire drive. They both had been Christmas gifts. The first was an album of Foreigner's. The second was a trumpet player named John Faddis.

Neither really appealed to me yet, since I was helping to drive, I needed something to keep me awake. I was then determined to listen to Foreigner until I had all their songs memorized. Over and over I played that album until finally, my dad took the CD out and very calmly said, "Let's listen to something else for a while."

That trip changed our opinion of Foreigner forever. I found a love for them and cherished the music as a way of remembering that road trip. My dad, on the other hand, is forever traumatized.

Now that I'm married and have kids, I have seen his patience with them. I have found myself striving to be more like him with patience as well as sacrifice. As mentioned before, we had to drive an hour to get to the school he worked from where we lived. That meant he had to commute every day. We wouldn't see him in the mornings and by the time he got home, there wasn't much time left before bed. Thankfully we had summers, but mostly that time was spent fixing up the house. By commuting, however, he gave us the chance to live close to our grandparents in a good city with great schools. I can't imagine how difficult it would have been to live in the town where he worked.

Even on the days where I struggle with not being able to see the kids as often as I would like, I think of my dad. He always did his best so we wouldn't have to worry about anything. I strive to do the same.

I will be strong when I remember his strength. I will be patient when I remember his patience. I will be a super cool parent when I remember how awesome my daddy is...or I'll just embarrass my kids. Either one works for me!

Family
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About the Creator

A. Marler

I primarily write fictional stories, varying in time periods and sub-genres. Constructive criticism is always welcome as I want to continue to improve!

I am a mom of 3 rambunctious boys with a love of many, many things!

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