Day 1: In Memoriam

This is a far different blog post than I normally share, but I think this situation warrants it. Today, I started my 64 day challenge in honor of my father, who passed away unexpectedly on January 16, 2011, one day after his 64th birthday.

I am very close to my family and my father was no exception. He was such a caring, funny, and intelligent man. When people first met him, they were normally somewhat intimidated by his stature, as he was built kind of like a tree - solid and strong and tall. He had a deep, gruff voice with a touch of Boston accent and his mouth was always covered by a graying mustache. He appeared to have a very calm and serious demeanor, always seemed very focused, and spoke and acted with intention.

However, when you got to know him, you realized his appearance belied his true nature. He was a giant teddy bear. Under the outward, shall we say, "saltiness," he was wonderfully goofy and silly. One of my favorite memories of my dad features him dancing (aka shaking his butt and wiggling his fingers) up and down the hallway between the kitchen and the family room, singing along to the "COPS" theme song. He loved puns and what I like to call "groaner" jokes, you know, where the only logical response is to groan dramatically and roll your eyes. His sense of humor was quite dry and people often had a hard time telling if he was joking or serious. Once you were in on the joke, you realized just how funny and clever he was.

His sense of humor was balanced by his incredibly hard work ethic and dedication to his commitments. My father was a workhorse, to say the least. If my dad had to call in to work, it was for a serious reason - and I barely recall two such instances in my life. He woke up at four o'clock in the morning every morning to begin his day. Despite clocking in twelve hour days, he never missed a play, a game, or a dance recital of mine or my sister's. He would even travel to my away games, regardless of how far away they were. He was a very active dad and took joy in being there for us.

Speaking of being there for us, if it weren't for my father, I would have been clueless in all my math and science classes. My father was a chemical engineer and had a brain that could figure out how just about anything worked. He spent countless hours tutoring me in things that my artsy brain had a hard time wrapping around. It was not unusual in high school for me to sit at the kitchen table with my dad for hours, going over homework, asking questions about concepts I didn't understand, having him check my work and challenge me to make sure I really understood and hadn't just figured out how to fake the answer. He cared very much about my success in school and made sure that it was very important to me to me, too.

My dad was a total car guy. He loved working in the garage on all of our cars. Until I moved to Texas, I never took my car to a mechanic, my dad just always did everything for me. He'd get up early on Saturdays to check the fluids in my car and make sure everything was running smoothly. Additionally, I can't count the number of times he gave rides to friends of ours whose cars had run into problems. One particular time springs to mind: several friends and I were at a rave in a city about an hour and a half away from my parents' house. We left the party at 5 am to find my friend's car had been stolen and we had no way home. I called my dad in the wee hours of the morning and told him the situation. Before I even hung up the phone, he had gotten dressed and was on his way. He spent the better part of the day driving us to our respective locations, which spanned two states (ok, New England states, but whatever).

Despite his reliability and penchant for working hard, he loved to have fun. He used to take my sister and I to carnivals all through the summer season and went on any ride we wanted to go on. I can remember screaming our lungs out together on many a roller coaster. He always let us play the midway games even though they're clearly rigged. We always managed to go home clutching some silly stuffed animal he either outright won for us or somehow helped us to win. On family vacations, we'd spend the majority of the time either in a pool or in the ocean. Dad liked to hoist my sister and I up on his shoulders and toss us across the water, while shouting a silly nonsense word I don't even know how to spell.

He wasn't one of those "intimidate the boyfriend" types, either. He trusted my judgment in cases of the heart and always welcomed whatever (usually inappropriate) guy I brought home with kindness and generosity. When I told him I was going to Texas to meet Jason for the first time (we met online), he looked up some buddies in the area and gave me their business cards so I could call them if anything happened - but he allowed me the freedom to go follow my heart. When he met Jason, it was amazing. They totally just clicked. They could sit and shoot the shit about just about anything. On one recent stay in Boston, I had to do some work while on vacation, so I was holed up in the living room with my laptop for the better part of a day. My dad and Jason just chilled together in the kitchen, reading the paper, watching TV, chatting about sports and cars and politics. I am so glad that Jason and my father had the opportunity to connect, to get to know and like each other. It means the world to me to know that my two main men got along so famously.

I could write about my dad forever, and will likely have more stories to share along the way, but it is time to bring this to a close. I dedicate this 64 day challenge to my father, John: for bringing me into this world, for teaching me strength through his example, for giving me my sense of humor, for his implicit faith in me, for helping the helpless, for being a shining example in the application of dedication, for showing me what a true work ethic is, for his unending patience with his wacky artsy daughter, for giving me 26 beautiful years, for being the best father I could have ever asked for.

Daddy, I love you. I always have; I always will. You were my hero. This one's for you.