Letter To Daddy In Heaven

January 21, 2017 · 

Letter to Daddy..

Dear Daddy,
Today is your birthday. It has been 31 years since I have been able to call home on this day and hear your voice. Donna told me that when I would call, you would ask, "who is that on the phone?" and when she would reply, Gloria, that you would get up out of where you was sitting to talk to me while saying, "my lil ole gal"..

My heart just clenched when she told me this, because I would give anything to hear you call me that again.

We would talk about how you were doing and you would thank me for the coveralls or shirts or money that I had sent for chicken feed, then we would talk about your chickens. You loved those thangs. Loved sitting watching them, loved making new boxes for them like you did when Wendi and I came home to visit when she was 11, and of course loved the eggs that they gave you.

Wendi loved you so much, Daddy. She followed you around and helped you do all of the things that you had to do, every day, while we were there. And when you saw her looking at that old swing frame that did not have a swing on it and you made her one with rope and a 2x4, you hung the moon in her eyes.

You looked at me one day and said, "she sure ain't lazy." And she isn't, even today. She works 60 to 70 hrs every week so that we have a good life. I could tell how proud you were of her and of me.

I was only two weeks post-op but I was working doing laundry and hanging it on the line, until I started bleeding from my surgical site. You told me that I needed to take it easy and I said, I don't know any other way to be and it's true. I am like this because you were like that.

You worked so hard to give us a roof over our head, food on our table, and money for a treat when we would ask. I wish that I had helped more than I did. When I think about you with the mules reins around your neck plowing the garden, after working a full week at the saw mill, it makes me cry. I hope that you know how much I appreciated you. I tried to tell you every time we talked and I tried to make sure that you had what you needed.

It is almost unbearable being without you, but Donna is here and we talk every day. We are together now like we were then. We always had each other and I am as thankful for that, as I am for having you for my daddy.

I know that you are happy in heaven and I know that you are with Mama. That is the only thing that brings me peace since you had to go home.

So today on your birthday, I just want you to know what an honor it was to be your lil ole gal. You always told me I was smart and that you wanted me to go to college. I did that Daddy, thinking of you the whole time and garnering strength from the way you worked for us, because it wasn't easy.

I always think of what you used to say if any of us kids complained that the meat was tough. You would say, "it would be tougher without" and that has sustained me in my life.

You weren't a learned man, but you knew so much about survival, about life, about getting things done and you never complained. Not when you had a major stroke, not when you were diagnosed diabetic, not when you were raising all us kids, alone.

I love you Daddy. I miss you Daddy.. Happy Birthday Daddy...
Signed.. Your lil ole gal...