Before
I dive in, let me express a personal word to you. I am quite frustrated that I’m not able to spend
more time writing blogs. As you see in
the sidebar, I have only written 38 blogs this year. That’s close to my record low of production
in this blog (in 2012 I only wrote 41 blogs). The lack of content doesn’t imply that I don’t
care about blogging anymore; I do care.
But I carry a lot of my dad’s responsibilities since his passing. First and foremost, this includes taking care
of my mom. I wanted to document this fact. I wanted you to understand my frustration. With that stated, let’s move on.
One
of the interesting components during the grieving process is, at night, you can
dream about your dearly departed loved one.
I’m not an expert on dreams, but apparently, the subconscious brain
remembers the way life used to be. I’ve
had a few of this particular sort of dream of late. I was with my dad, spending time with him, as
if nothing had happened. The dream is
happy, but when you wake up from such a dream, you remember afresh the present
reality of life. You remember again the
magnitude of the loss, and just how drastically the landscape of your life has
changed.
While
it’s true that my dad is no longer with us (the Bible says, for the believer in Jesus Christ, to be absent from
the body is to be present with the Lord), there is a very real sense that he
will never be gone. Let me try to
explain what I mean with a story of something that happened to me at my work at
Chick-fil-A:
The
other day, I was complimented for the way I took orders on what we call
headset; this is the device that we wear to communicate with cars that pull up
at the drive-thru speaker. I was told
that I greeted each car as if the customer was my best friend. I thanked the person and said that I inherited
my dad’s radio voice. At one point in
the conversation, this customer commented that it’s not just the voice; it’s
also the heart. She then asked this
captivating question: “Did you inherit your dad’s heart?” My answer, in part, was that my dad was very
selfless, and I want to follow in his footsteps.
My
dad’s example lives on. I will strive to follow his unselfish example. I will strive to live my life selflessly, as he did. I will strive to follow his legacy of
humility, love for others, honorable ethics, integrity, and faith in God. The
saying is “like father, like son.” Of
course, in some cases, a son has to make his own path because the father’s life
wasn’t worthy of emulating. But that’s
not the situation here. In my case, I am
honored to take the baton my dad has passed on to me. Or, as I put it to that dear customer, I want to follow in his footsteps.
Kevin
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