Remembering Dad

 My dad passed away on 2/24/16 and my heart still hurts. To say I was blessed with a wonderful dad would be an understatement, and it would take at least a year of blog posts to convey my love for him adequately.  With that in mind, I'll share a mere two or three precious and memorable moments:

   ~       Some family friends had a go-cart, and we all went to a large, empty parking lot one day. Dad was quite worried when I got behind the wheel because I was only nine or ten.  He made the unfortunate decision of monitoring my motoring skills by walking in front of me. Lowering my helmeted head and envisioning a bulls-eye, I floored it...chasing him all over the parking lot.  (Evil child, evil child). I'm sure a YouTube video of that event would have accumulated a gazillion hits!

 ~        I was involved in a freak accident at a baseball game when I was twenty-three. The bat slipped out of the batter's hand and flew into the stands, landing on my forehead. (I had a concussion, four skull fractures, and twenty-eight stitches). Being the consummate comedian, he would tell me my black eyes reminded him of the Tareyton cigarette commercial, "I'd rather fight than switch." I did look like a boxer that had gone too many rounds!

This last memory affects me to this day...

~      My dad loved Honky Tonk music; in fact, he passed while listening to one of his favorite CDs.  As a child, I remember him down in the basement, blasting Big Tiny Little, Knuckles O'Toole, and Eddie Barns, to name a few.  On Saturday mornings that music was a "call for duty."  My sister and I knew the minute the music started that it was time to "Police up the Area" (clean the house). A while back, after my parents moved in with us, I came up with the bright idea to create a CD with Dad's favorites since he didn't have a turntable anymore. (Not too bright, Patti). He played those CDs all the time, which explained why my house was always spotless.  To this day, if I need any encouragement to clean the house, I put on his CD.  Memories come back, and I use my falling tears instead of Pledge to dust. 

Dad, you and I went through a lot in my sixty+ years, but what warms my heart and humbles me the most was your unconditional love.  The period in my life when I fell as far as anyone could, the days when I caused you unrelenting embarrassment and heartache, your hand was always there to pick me up, and your arms were there to hug me.

I Love and Miss You So Very Much...

 

Meditation on the Lord's Prayer

 

My grandmother's worn Bible is filled with underlines and sidenotes. Inside I found a neatly folded paper typed with an old manual typewriter. At the bottom, my grandmother wrote: From "Lift Up Your Hearts," by W. Russell Bowie. I did an internet search, and that book was published in 1940. 

This meditation is a treasure; I'm sure Nannie is happy I'm sharing it.    

 

Our Father, who art in Heaven,

 Help me to believe this day that there is a power to lift me up, which is stronger than all things that hold me down.

  Hallowed be thy Name,

 Help me to be sensitive to what is beautiful and responsive to what is good so that day by day, I may grow more sure of the Holiness of life in which I want to trust.

 Thy kingdom come,

 Help me to be quick to see and ready to encourage whatever brings the better meaning of God into that which otherwise might be common ground of the uninspired day.

  Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven,

 Help me believe that the ideals of the spirit are not a far-off dream but a power to command my loyalty and direct my life here on our real earth.

 Give us this day our daily bread,

 Open the way for us to earn an honest living without anxiety, but let us never forget the needs of others, and make us want only that benefit for ourselves which will also be their gain.

 And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.

 Make us patient and sympathetic with the shortcomings of others, especially of those we love, and keep us sternly watchful only of our own.  Let us never grow hard with the unconscious cruelty of those who measure themselves by mean standards and so think they have excelled.  Keep our eyes lifted to the highest; so that we may be humbled, and seeing the failures of others, be forgiving because we know how much there is of which we need to be forgiven.

 Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil,

 Let me not go carelessly this day within reach of any evil I cannot resist ... but if, in the path of duty, I must go where temptation is, give me the strength of spirit to meet it without fear.

 For thine is the kingdom and the power, and the glory forever and ever.  Amen.

 And so in my heart may I carry the knowledge that Thy greatness is above me and around me and that Thy grace through Jesus Christ, my Master is sufficient for all my needs.

 Amen

My Beautiful Grandmother
"Nannie"