Hello Dad –
The kids and I celebrated your 73rd birthday on Friday (sorry for the late post) with ice cream at the cemetery. We sang happy birthday to you and Lia cleaned up your headstone. We laughed when we shared memories, and then Lia cried when I said I could mentally picture you standing there. It is getting harder and harder for her to remember what you looked like without a picture. Fortunately, we were able to quick pull up a picture (one good thing these smart phones allow us to do).
Last week as I thought about your birthday approaching and what I would like to write I was reminded of something I read recently in a John Maxwell book. Dad, I am glad I am able to write to you and my hope has always been to not just help myself, but to help others as I write about the lessons life has thrown at me. I even shared today with a friend about a conversation you and I had during your treatments in Ann Arbor. You were telling me you were not sure why you had to feel the way you were feeling. Why did it take feeling so bad to then hopefully feel good? I remember assuring you that if you kept on fighting, whatever the outcome, that we would pray something good would come from it all. Maybe the doctors could learn something or maybe you could help another patient. Or maybe it would be a nurse, doctor, hospital custodian who would wonder what is different about this man. Maybe they would wonder how you could continue to push through and wonder where your strength was coming from. So with this blog today I hope others will read some wise advice from Barbara Bush as she talks about the future comparing it to a train ride.
We get onboard that train at birth, and we want to cross the continent because we have in mind that somewhere out there is a station. We pass by sleepy little towns looking out the window of life’s train, grain fields and silos, level grade crossings, buses full of people on the roads beside us. We pass by cities and factories, but we don’t look at any of it because we want to get to the station. We believe that out there is a station where a band is playing and banners are hung and flags are waving and when we get there that will be life’s destination. We don’t really get to know anybody on the train. We pace up and down the aisles looking at our watches eager to get to the station because we know that life has a station for us. This station changes for us during life. To begin with, for most of us it’s turning 18, getting out of high school. Then the station is that first promotion, and then the station becomes getting the kids out of college, and then the station becomes retirement, and then….all too late we recognize the truth…that this side of that city whose builder is God, there really isn’t a station. The joy is in the journey, and the journey is the joy. Sooner or later you realize there is no station and the truth of life is the trip. Read a book, eat more ice cream, go barefoot more often, hug a child, go fishing, laugh more. The station will come soon enough. And as you go, find a way to make this world more beautiful.
Dad, my hope is that you and I can help others realize that until we reach that eternal station it is about finding joy in the journey. Sometimes, it is definitely more difficult to find that joy, but it is there. Thank you Dad for the life lessons and I hope you enjoyed another birthday. Love you!