Nothing Could Be Father From The Truth

It's Father’s Day.  I think a lot of times this day gets lumped in between several birthdays, graduations and weddings that we cram into this time of year.  I know we shouldn’t spend just one day a year honoring the men who have raised us or the men who are helping us raise our children.  But today, more than most days and more than other Father’s Days in the past, I was particularly struck by just how important to me the men in my life are.  I am blessed to have the most loving dad a girl can ask for. I don’t know how he does it, but somehow he has stayed married to my mom for almost 39 years (no easy accomplishment in this day and age). He raised four daughters. Yes ladies and gentlemen, that means he is outnumbered 5:1 (6:1 If you count the cat). My dad is a man of immeasurable patience. He is strong and gentle at the same time. He is fair and kind and generous and has lavished grace on me my whole life.  Everyone who meets him, loves him. You can’t help it.  I know it cannot have been easy to love me at times but there was NEVER a time in my life he didn’t make me feel loved. No matter what mistakes I made or how badly I had let him down. I always figured when I was a little girl, someday I’ll marry a guy just like my dad.

Now if any of you are lucky enough to  know my dad and Shamus, you would say that on the surface, they don’t seem to be very much alike.  While my dad prefers to sit on the sidelines, Shamus always wants to be the center of attention. While my dad’s quiet way has calmed some of the fiercest arguments between me and my sisters, Shamus is better at starting trouble and stirring up controversy at family functions. While my dad’s way of parenting was to do as much as he could to keep us from hurting ourselves, Shamus has a more “what’s the worst that can happen” kind of approach. And yet, every day, I see a lot of my dad in Shamus. It’s in the way he hugs Aiden after he had to discipline him for something…just like my dad used to do. It’s in the way he kisses the boys and says, “You know I love you” for no reason at all…just like my dad does. It’s in the way he tries to live his life in a way that he  wants his sons to emulate and more importantly, it’s in the way he owns up to his mistakes when he falls short… just like my dad. It isn’t just the things Shamus does as a father that reminds me of my dad, but in the way he has always treated me.  I couldn’t begin to list all the ways he has shown his strength, loyalty, generosity, kindness and grace to me over the almost 14 years we’ve been married.  I am thankful that Shamus has a dad who instilled these values into him, like my dad did for me.

So while it would seem on the surface that I married a man very different from my dad, nothing could be Father from the truth.