A tribute to my dad

There are days when I just miss someone so much.  I wish I could pick up the phone and call them.  Or go have coffee with them and watch a movie.  Get some good home cooked food, comfort food.  I miss them both...on different occasions.  Sometimes I miss em together, and other times, I miss them separately.

I look at them and think, man they had their shit together.  They were doing it right.  Even if it is dysfunctional, they had it right.  I mean who is society to judge these days. We are just as dysfunctional with technology.  The iphone or android end up taking care of our kids.  I watched today as two parents did'nt even talk to one another, just handed off their phones to their kids to play while eating because it becomes to hard to take care of kids while they are eating.  How the hell did our parents do it?

Anyhow, my tangent needs to be redirected.  I miss him, my father.  There is so much I want to know about him.  I want to go back and meet the 18 year old him, the 22 year old him the 27 year old him. I want to know about him and listen to him in his younger years as he speaks, his mannerisms, his personality.  I look at his picture and I feel I know absolutely nothing about the man staring back at me.

Underneath all the facade he created, he was a great man.  He had a heart of gold and inspired people.  I guess in some way I carry on that legacy.  He was an avid learner and loved to read.  He taught my cousin Janet how to dance, He made puppets and did puppet shows for the orphanage every week, he loved music and he was a brilliant chef.  He built furniture from materials laying around the garage.  He could envision something and build it as he did with an aviary, his masterpiece backyard in Mississippi and his two travel agencies, one in california and one is Mississippi.

August 24 will be 14 years and it seems like yesterday.  I wish I could have those father to son conversations with him at times, have him call me out on my bullshit.  We could talk politics and movies.  He would share with me his adventures and I would spit coffee out of my nose from laughing so hard.  He died too early.  He didn't take the best care of himself.  I wish he would have, for my sake.  I wish he were here now.  He would be 74 this October.  He had a lot to teach me...I still have so much to learn.  I miss you dad...more than you can feel.  Or maybe you can.