My dad went to Heaven on July 2, 2013. This is what I said about him at his memorial service.
What Dad taught me.
The last few months has made me realize just how valuable
the legacy my dad left me is. He was a son, a brother, a cousin, a husband, an
uncle, a father and grandfather and a friend. He was an engineer, a hiker, a
camper and a teacher. He taught me a lot as I was growing up and into my adult
years, right up until the day he died.
My dad loved books. He taught me to love the written word.
As a very young child he would sit me on his lap and read the comics from the
newspaper to me. He taught me to hunger after knowledge. He was a treasure
chest of knowledge and of wisdom. I always said he was the encyclopedia
salesman’s best friend. Our home was filled with encyclopedias and books. Often
he would tell us to look up the answer and let us learn by our own efforts. My
dad taught me to love to read and to love knowledge. My dad used to tell us
that his mother once said to him “I hope that one day you have a little boy who
asks as many questions as you do and he drives you crazy too.” Her wish not
only came true it was quad tripled by three sons and a daughter who all loved
to ask questions.
My dad taught me to love history. He made history come to
life for my brothers and me with his love of museums and historical sites. We
visited old forts, California missions, historical houses and battleships. We
took a trip to the East Coast one year and since I had studied about the Battle
of Lake Champlain that year, he made a detour just so I could get a glimpse of
that lake.
My dad taught me to love nature. Our vacations were full of
national parks, hikes, camping and beaches. He loved the outdoors so much that
every house we lived in was close to nature. He even found a house in the city
of Oakland that bordered on a canyon full of opossums and rabbits and an
occasional deer. We lived in Gresham surrounded by forest on two sides and a
dairy farm on the third. When I was in college, he and my mother and brother,
Tim, moved into a house in Los Angeles that was a block and a really big step
to the ocean.
He taught me to appreciate family. He loved his sister and
Billie Jean and her family are still a big part of my life, as well was my
dad’s cousin, Dick Austin’s family. As a child, I remember going to Fresno,
California for family reunions. In the eighties, my cousin Christine, Billie’s
daughter and I arranged family reunions that inspired my genealogy research. It
was fun to listen to my Great-Aunts and my dad’s cousins tell stories of the
family and my dad’s misadventures as a child.
My dad taught me how to be a faithful friend. He didn’t have
a lot of close friends but those who were stayed in his life until either their
death or his own. He went to every one of his high school class reunions until
the one two years ago when his health was starting to limit his mobility. And
as he grew weaker and closer to his home-going to Heaven, I heard wonderful
things about his sweet nature and his knowledge from the friends who knew him
in the final phase of his life on this earth.
My dad taught me that kindness was better then wisdom. A
couple of months ago, my cousin Kent told me “Your dad is the kindest man I’ve
ever known.” What a tribute to a quiet man who didn’t just expose his heart in
words but in his deeds. I’ve been noticing lately that a lot of people use the
word “kind” about my dad. He exposed his heart in the love and compassion he
showed to other people. He worked in soup kitchens, tutored a neighbor’s home
schooled children in math, and he and my mom welcomed a young college student
who was a stranger to them at the time into their home several years ago. Yenny
is now a part of our family and a legacy to my dad’s and my mom’s warm hearts. And Dad and my mom took my son and me in when we were homeless.
Dad taught me that I was loved. I have a very positive
picture of what our Father in Heaven is like because of my dad. I am very, very
fortunate to have had an earthly father who reflects his Heavenly Father.
Theology was a great passion in my dad’s earthly life. He knew his Bible and he
knew his God. As the gates of heaven open up for him, I can almost hear Our
Lord saying, “Well done, my good and faithful servant.”
My dad taught me a lot of things and I will forever be
grateful to him for those lessons.
