A Father’s Day Tribute

I owe a lot to my parents. They both were a very integral part of the person I grew and continue to grow into, each in their own ways. Even though neither one of them are alive today, their presence is with me always. I often think of the gifts they gave me, the lessons they taught.

As usual this Father’s Day has me thinking about my dad, who he was as a person, and who he was as a father. It’s easy for people to think they know someone and that that person has been important in their life but when that person is your parent it’s a very different relationship. A parent is often with us since birth until they walk on. Up to that point, that’s your entire life. It’s a unique relationship in that as we change and grow, so do our perceptions and how we see everything including our parents. Of course a child’s perspective can be skewed and yet in many ways children know those individuals called “parents” better than anyone. Sometimes a child’s unflinching honesty can be painful to hear but like I said, children in many ways know the real deal with no sugar coating. They see the good. They see the bad and every thing in-between. And likewise, few beings can push a parent’s buttons more than a child except perhaps a spouse and I certainly was no exception in the “button pushing” arena.

When my father passed, and even since his passing, many people contacted me in one way or another. Each of them had a different story of my dad and who he was for them. Yet none of them really saw the whole person. Honestly at times it annoyed me and sometimes still does. People see a tiny sliver of a person or they spend a few months or years with someone and think they know everything about that person. Most often they’re just seeing who that person was at that moment. That particular moment or time in their life. And more than likely, they see who that person wanted them to see. I believe when you can look at the totality of who a person is without embellishing or romanticizing, then you can say you truly know and love them.

I’d like to think I had a pretty good view of my dad and who he was at different points in his life. Although I wasn’t incarnate prior to the 26 years of his life before I was born, in a very real way I knew him then too. In a person’s DNA is truly everything about them well beyond eye and hair color. Their likes and dislikes, their hopes and dreams, and every experience they’ve ever had, all coded into serpent-like genetic blueprints. So for the record, I think I know him better than anyone.

No one needs to say how important the father-daughter relationship is. Fathers play a crucial part of a women’s self esteem, how she sees herself, if she knows that her presence, that she matters in this universe, and how she puts herself out in the world. My dad certainly wasn’t an easy man by any stretch of the imagination. Much of the way he lived flew in the face of convention. A trait that his many admirers so loved about him but as a daughter it frequently had its challenges. I’ve often said that I earned the right to be my father’s daughter. Such was the incongruity of my dad’s parenting that I knew how to read a race sheet at 5, I’d not only been exposed to the Tao but it was a part of my regular reading, and I could play a pretty decent game of chess much to my father’s chagrin. Such were the contradictions that was Haviland, my dad. Still, some of the conventional attributes of family life that gives a child a certain stability and a sense of security were oftentimes absent.

Nonetheless, my father always had an acute sense of what was crucial and on that he never missed the mark. Even so far as being able to instill in me things he never got growing up. An unshaking self-reliance, a great fondness of books and learning, an insatiable creativity, an ability to see through the bullshit of life and sometimes people, and an undying love, appreciation, and awe for the Earth and all her beings, are just a few of those gifts that I treasure. Suffice it to say there were times his attention wasn’t as centered on home as I certainly would have liked, and yet I still managed to squirrel away a lifetime full of memories. My dad and I often hiked together. Those are truly some of my fondest memories. I’ve yet to meet anyone as skilled as he was in that area. My dad knew of the plants, the medicinal ones and the edible ones, the trees, and of how the animals moved. He knew how to move silently in the woods without being detected or leaving any trace of his presence. In the woods a stillness would often come over him and a sense that he was finally at peace with himself. Something that I would find early on within myself as well. Many times he would convey a teaching with few or no words. Not many people, if any, have the skill to do that. He had an uncanny ability with plants and we often had incredible gardens. He transferred his love of them easily to me and that passion guides my life today. He was a very hard worker although I believe his creative mind was not designed for the grind of modern life. Later in his earth walk he took up the brush again and his paintings were incredible. Mainly scenes of nature, expressive passionate works, and a few of me that I treasure.

My father was many things in his life. A father, a husband, a son, a brother, an uncle, a painter, a landscaper, a leader, a trickster. He had an incredible faith in my abilities and instilled in me the belief that I could do anything. Bringing home an A on a report card I often heard “Why wasn’t it an A plus?”. I understood my father’s meaning in that he thought I was just the brightest being ever although it at times aggravated me. Now it makes me smile and although I often push myself too much, through his urging I’ve had the courage to pursue what’s in my heart and to not settle for what doesn’t make me happy and isn’t who I am.

Stepping on my spiritual path so early in my young adulthood afforded me the opportunity of much reflection on my life and everything within it. Without such introspection I don’t know if I would see with the clarity that I do today. I understand my father now more than I ever did and yet, as long as I live I’ll continue to learn about him and through that, about myself. One of my most poignant memories of my dad is him teaching me to swim on a lake we went to, often. After showing me how, he would put keep his arms under me to hold me up in the water, and then he would say “Now swim.” After a while, I would always “But daddy your arms aren’t there anymore” and he’d say “I’ve got you, I’ve got you. See you’re doing it, you’re swimming.” Even though he’s no longer on the physical plane, I still often hear him saying “I’ve got you, I’ve got you, don’t worry you’re doing it on your own…”