Often on summer nights, my dad could be found sitting on the front porch. It may have been because the home we lived in did not have air conditioning and it was cooler there in the night breeze. Or, perhaps it was the fact that the house was small and, in peak season, we were a family of eight. Occasionally, I would slow down enough to join him. Though this was his opportunity for peace and quiet, he never seemed bothered by my intrusion. He would tell me the latest joke or a story from his growing up or army days. One night he told me how he and his brothers saved up enough money to walk the several miles into town from their home in the country and watch a show at the movie house. After the movie was over they started the walk home. The sky was cloudy and there was no moon or stars to light the road ahead. As they got further and further from the lights of town, it eventually became so dark that they could not even see the dirt road in front of them. The boys just stood there in place for a time, not knowing what to do. Fortunately for them, that night there was a distant thunderstorm, which would generate an occasional flash of lightening in the dark sky. They discovered that these flashes would momentarily light the road ahead! The boys stood still until one of these flashes occurred and then they would run as fast and as far as they could until it became dark again. Then they would wait for the next flash, repeating this process until they eventually made their way back home.

As an adult, I have come to realize that, just as the lightening lit the way for my father and his siblings to find their way back home, my father (and mother) in a very real sense lit the way for me. Dad was not one to preach sermons—he wasn’t even a “church-going-man” for much of my young life—but he did live with integrity. He treated others kindly and saw anyone in need as his neighbor. Though he did not say it often, I never remember doubting that he loved me. To the very end of his life, he and Mom endured faithfully the health challenges life gave to him.

It has been many years now since Dad passed away. As I write this, I am sitting at an old roll-top desk that belonged to him. He sat here on many occasions with an antique calculator (the kind with a pull arm to perform each calculation) settling up his insurance collection business. The desk was given to him by the widow of a former customer; she said her husband thought so highly of Dad he wanted him to have it. This was indicative of the feelings of many who knew him. His customers had such trust in him that, if they were not going to be home the day that he came to collect their premium payment, they would tell him to just walk in and they would leave it on the table.

Though my children were born before Dad passed away, they never had the opportunity to really know the man that I knew; I wish they had. One night, not long after his death, I sat at this same roll-top as memories flooded my mind—memories of his life and all the things he had done for me. I had always known my dad was a good man; though as a teenager there were times I was embarrassed by him and saw things I might wish to change about him. But, in that moment of clarity I realized in a very powerful way that, even though he was not a perfect man, he was in fact the “world’s first perfect dad” for me."