Top Dad

Absolute adoration. That is what I'd say my father has for me. I have never doubted his deep love for me, whether it was shown by his glossy eyed stares across the dinner table or the nickname he gave me long ago - "B.O." ( for beautiful one, not body odor). The look on his face (like the one in the above picture on the morning of my wedding day) is enough to show the pride and delight that he has in being my father. Moments like these are when I feel like there is nobody on the planet who loves me as much as he does.

But I'm not convinced that my dad knows just how much I adore him. After I posted a nice mother's day blog entry, my dad was obviously very touched, but I'm guessing that he thought to himself, "I'll never get a post like that." He must sometimes feel like he's "on the sidelines" while watching my mom and me chat and share stories and moments that I think he wishes he could be a part of. He knows that when I call home and ask to speak to him it's probably because I need help with the computer, or maybe I have a business related question. It's rarely the good stuff...my feelings, why I am so excited or so upset, what I did with my friends and what so and so said to so and so and yada, yada, yada. Mom always gets the teary phone calls, and she's usually the shoulder that I cry on first.

How could my dad fully understand the love and respect I have for him? Afterall, I spent most of my teenage years rolling my eyes at him (and a big part of my adulthood too!). Every morning when he drove me to the school bus he would smile cheerfully and ask me lots of questions - at the time it was torture. Like myself, he's not a morning person. But given the chance to spend 5 minutes in the morning with me, he was the happiest guy on the planet. (I get it now. Since Isabelle came into my life I have never been more eager to get up and get the day started -- her smiling face is better than all the sunshine in the world!)

I'd be lying if I said we didn't give my dad a hard time. Whether it's the Walmart red t-shirt he wears all the time, his over-dramatic shrieks from the kitchen around dinnertime, "inappropriate" remarks at the dinner table, or the crazy rhymes he recites, my father is always giving us reasons to poke fun at him. But that's part of why we love him as much as we do.
I used to think that my dad and I couldn't be more different. He is brilliantly smart and driven. He is a workaholic and a perfectionist. Everything he does he does well. And "well" for him is usually the best. Whether it's top of the class, Morehead Scholar, president of The Bar, top lawyer, skilled photographer, chef, computer geek, or just being a dad, he is always on the top.

When I was young my dad always said I'd be the next lawyer in the family. He loved to chant "phi beta kappa" when we'd discuss my studies at his alma mater, UNC - Chapel Hill. He had such high expectations of me, and they were expectations that I didn't think I could achieve. I'd say, "Not everyone's like you, dad. We can't all be the best at everything we do." I shrugged it off, but secretly I wanted to be just like my dad. I want to be smart, successful and respected by my piers. A born introvert, I want to be an extrovert; I want to be funny and able to make others laugh. Most of all, I wanted to be a good person. Just like my dad.

The truth is that I'm a lot like me father...more similar than I'd like to admit. Not only did I get his round nose and big ears, but I'm also a nightowl --we tend to work into the night and when the morningtime comes we are happy to stay in bed while the rest of the world gets up. I got my artistic skills from my dad, and my hard head from him too. We are both spontaneous and we are up for new adventures.

I'll never forget when he compared me to the Holly Hunter character in Broadcast News. He said the first scene of her as a young child was just like me. Intense was the word he had used to describe me. I was astonished. Intense? Me? Now I realize that he probably was right. And I got that trait from him too.

Some things are just innate. You can be born with brains, ambition, even an understanding of justice. My father was probably born with all of those things. I was not, but I've been lucky enough to have him as my role model, and through him I have been able to learn some of those things. Through his example I have also learned a bit about faith, a lot about honesty, about how to achieve goals, and about how to have fun.

No matter the activity, if it was with me, my dad would take part. Even at the risk of embarressing himself (and me!). One of my first team sports was softball, and who was the team coach? You got it. Dad! He worked a lot, but when he wasn't working he was playing with his kids.
(That's me on the left and my future sorority sister and "cousin-in-law", Melissa, second to the right!)
Years later when I played field hockey in highschool, my dad went out and bought a stick so that we could hit balls in the backyard together. That's one devoted dad.

My dad is the fun parent, the silly one who acts like a kid a lot. One of our similar traits is our love for singing (and specifically our love for showtunes). He loves to carry a tune (and does so more than he should). Sometimes we belt it out together. On my wedding day, my dad was beaming with pride.
But it was on the day that he became a grandfather that my dad was probably most proud.
I thought he adored me, but I've never seen him adore anything more than he adores my baby. It is borderline obsessive. This I realized when he wrote the sweetest poem about his love for his new grandbaby, and a few weeks later he made a CD of all the songs he could find with "Isabelle". I'll never forget when he called me one day from the drug store when Isabelle was a few months old - he said he "just happened to be on the baby aisle" and wondered what brand of pacifier Isabelle uses. He wanted to be sure to have some at their house. Then just a few months ago he came home from a business trip with 2 pairs of overalls for her. He wanted his grandbaby to wear Osh Koshes just like we did when we were little. So much of how we are shaped is by the influence of our parents. I am always amazed at the incredible person my father has become, especially because he did not have a father of his own for most of his life. Life without a father? I cannot imagine, because my father is everything to me.
And I know that Isabelle will feel the same way. Just like me, she is a very lucky little girl to be so adored by her own father. Since pictures are a thousand words, check out the slideshow I made for Isabelle's daddy here.

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!