Happy Father's Day, Dad

Dear Dad,

Happy Father's Day and your Birthday, too, of course!

I just wanted to share this photograph of a distant memory of our lives together as kids when you were there to guide and support us.  You and Mom gave us so many opportunities when we were teenagers to see and experience the world in so many ways.  

I think this may have been 1969, when I was all of 15 years old and heading out for one of the two Boy Scouts trips I took to Idaho for the Jamboree and to New Mexico for Philmont.  I remember how friends were so impressed that you permitted me to go to both that summer (when the 'Eagle' landed on the moon, which we watched on big screens in Idaho...).  

Maybe those were some of the early experiences that gave me that infectious travel bug.  No doubt they were part of it...  as it wasn't many years after that I was darting back and forth to California during college, plus a couple trips to Europe in high school and college...  

Then, of course, as we know, the doors opened and never quite closed...  What you supported and encouraged when I was younger became global as I became an adult in my own right.  Stephenville, DeWitt, Amherst, DC, Bangkok, Kathmandu, Budhanilkantha...  

Then in the extended story, Tukche, NMH, Georgetown, Deep Springs, SOAS.  

As they say: 'to infinity and beyond!'  Such has become the nature of my world(s)...

But it's funny, Dad, in many of the 1950s/60s photographs that you took that Bruce has kindly digitalized for all of us, have airplanes or tarmacs or cars in the background.  

Movement.  On the move.  On the road.  Mobility in America.  Changing places.  Taking a drive.  Catching a jet plane.  Jumping a train.  Flitting b/n Syracuse and NYC, New Jersey or Florida...  

That was a part of our collective childhood that becomes even more apparent while taking the time to enjoy those olde photographs.  They are treasure trove!  Thanks for taking them for us to enjoy so many decades later.

I hope you are in peace, Dad, wherever it is we all go when we finish with this temporary, enjoyable human, earthly stage.  We shared a great life together.  You were a wonderful and caring father to all of us.  You always wanted the best for each of us.  

Through the daily joys and struggles of life, we each found our way in the world.  Different ways, in some ways; quite simple and similar in other ways.  Thanks for always being there as a guide, protector and inspiration.  You gave us everything, especially your love.  

I hope you can hear our thoughts and affection.  Even if you can't hear them, they are out there in the wide world.  Someday, maybe, we'll each understand these transitions better.  

But I'm sure sending our love out there can never be lost.  Wherever it goes..

lots of love, Dad,  Keith