Walking In His Shoes: Remembering Dad on Father's Day



I went to visit my father a few years ago. Mom had recently passed, and he was doing well in an assistive living environment. In his 90’s, he was mentally active, interested in what was going on in the world, wanted up-dates on the grandchildren, enjoyed sharing farm memories, and was always comfortable talking about his faith in our Almighty God. We often would settle him in a car and take him for the ten mile ride to the family farm. He would check out the fields, enjoy the clouds, and remember.

The days of his wandering in a meandering, but purposeful journey from corncrib to barn to hog lot to machine shed were over. However, his footprints were all over the farm. He had left his mark in the toolshed, in the fields swaying with corn and beans, in the yard where my brothers, Dad, and I played softball every day after summer lunch. His tracks were in the grove surrounding the farmhouse, under the apple trees, and down the quarter-mile lane and back.

He often wore heavy boots to protect his feet from the messy areas of the farm or possible injury when getting on and off heavy equipment. But since his move into town, he chose black leather shoes with two Velcro straps. Easy to take on and off.  I had not paid much attention to them, except on that particular day, when we sat side by side for our visit, I noticed them. They were exactly like mine.

I had to laugh. Although I think I’m “with it” as far as fashion is concerned in my corner of the world, there it was. I had shoes on just like my 90+ year old father: comfortable, worthy shoes.

I’ll never know what it was really like to walk in my dad’s shoes: fighting in WW II, raising six children on an average sized farm, serving on various boards, and, then, helping my mother in her final stages of cancer. Dad is no longer with us, but if I could have a measure of his love for God, of his spirituality; if I could but walk in shoes similar to his, just for this, I would be thankful.