My Parents

Today I have been thinking and writing a lot about my childhood. I have so many wonderful memories of both of my parents ranging from movie dates with my Daddy to gardening and yard sale hopping with my Mom.
They have a form of parenting that is so unique. I have yet to be able to compare with any other form of parenting I've seen. 

No. They aren't perfect.

They of course made their hand full of mistakes but they were always, and still are always, willing to listen to our side of the story. Even if they don't understand, they try to respect our views and decisions to the best of their ability, us knowing that it can't have always been easy for them to do so.

I'm really lucky.

We just helped celebrate their 40th wedding anniversary last year and even though I know they have had their share of problems throughout the years, they're love for each other was strong enough to have stayed together through it all. Not everybody can say that about their parents and I know these days, it's not the norm. But their strength and their love is what, I believe, helped my brother Pat and I each choose the right person as our spouse to be with for the next 40++ years.

We are both still very new, me more so, at this whole marriage phenomenon, but we had our parents as guidelines to learn from, taking with us the lessons from the good and the bad times between the two of them. They gave us a fabulous childhood regardless what they might or might not have been going through. And I will be forever grateful for this.

So thank you Mom and Dad.

Thank you for the family vacations and the often rained upon camping and hiking trips. Thank you Daddy for all of the piggy back rides to bed each night and for making up voices for all of my stuffed animals. Thank you Mom for introducing me to my love of Audrey Hepburn and Rogers and Hammerstein musicals. Thank you both for having such great taste in music, old movies and t.v. shows, Doctor Who, Andy Griffith, Elvis and The Beatles included among my favorites. Thank you Mom for blueberry muffins and Saturday morning cartoons  and Daddy for the best french toast ever on Sunday mornings even after you'd worked a full night's shift the night before. Thank you for all of the notes left in lunchboxes. Thank you for always listening, supporting and loving. Thank you for yelling when we deserved it...and even when we didn't. Thank you for letting us get away with certain things, choosing your battles as you went, letting us be kids and allowing us to make our own mistakes.

I'm only lightly touching on many of the things I remember from my younger years. You guys are the best and I love you, not just because you're my parents, but because you are truly wonderful people.


"Before the mountains call to you
Before you leave this home
I will teach your heart to trust
As I will teach my own
But sometimes I will ask the moon
Where it shined upon you last
And shake my head and laugh and say
It all went by too fast"
Dar Williams