Happy birthday, Dad.

Today my dad, Mr. Zyp to many of you, turns sixty-nine. Really, Dad? Sixty-nine.I want to write what he means to me, so I sit, fingers poised.

How do I sum up the world in one post?

I wrote recently of his example of love, and if you have not read it, I pray you pause and do now.  My dad is worth your time. 🙂

I want to find him the perfect gift, that will somehow convey what he means to me. But again,

how do you wrap up the world in a box?

So Dad, instead of giving you a gift, I’ll simply list out mine.

• Dancing around the May Pole. I barefoot in that long turquoise dress. You in polo shirt and PE shoes. I proud. You prouder.
• Working on my free-throws. How many times did you say,”Keep your elbow in!”  A thousand. My elbow still creeps out, Dad.
• Going to that minor league baseball game. I telling you about a guy I liked. Scared to death, I told you. “His name is Jeff Patterson…”
• You scaring many boys to death. Thank you.
• Being tiny, sitting on your lap, fingering your earlobe. I loved the feel: Soft and rough at the same time. Just like you.
• “Daddy, can I marry you when I grow up?”
• You always tearing up when you pray.
• Boat rides.
• You silly. Always silly. Riding bikes at the beach and coming around the corner to find you on your back, riding your bike upside down.
• Waving goodbye every morning out those big front room windows, waiting excitedly for that one spot when we could see you down the road. How you always knew to hold your arm out the window and wave. Knowing we were back there, waiting and waving.
• Hearing the sound of the garage door open. “Daddys’ home!”
• You getting pulled over for speeding and listening to you lecture the police offer that he should quit wasting his time giving measy 5-mile-over speeding tickets when real creeps were out in the world.  No one ever said you didn’t speak your mind.
• How you built those wooden lap-tables for us so we could have all our books and colors and papers with us on those long road trips to your basketball games.
• Watching you ref. Being about to burst with pride that I got in free to all the games because you were my dad. I thought you were a celebrity. Now I know you are.
• How you taught me to ride my bike that one Christmas, freezing cold, driveway a sheet of ice. How many miles did you run holding onto the back of the seat?
• Jeep rides up in the snow.
• The gym you built in our backyard. A gym! I still sometimes shake my head at that. Who gets to have a gym in their backyard?!
• That moment–was I nine-years-old?– after we moved from our Deardorff drive house, when just you and I went back for one last look, make sure we hadn’t forgot anything. How we stood in that entry-way.  I had started to cry and tried to hide it, then looked and you were too.  You looked at me and I could read your mind, you’d carried me home from the hospital to that house.
• Building that house on Wright Rd, how we hadn’t drilled the well yet so we had to ride our bikes to the neighbors’ house and bring home buckets of water. Showering in the locker room at school late at night. I just remember all that being SO fun, which has everything to do with you…
• All those summers in high school building decks together. All those complaints about the 3-minute lunch breaks we were allowed and the $5/hour wages I received.  You worked me hard and now I’m so very glad.
• And now, the countless hours you have invested in my family–my husband, my kids. You are Papa and you are their prize. They adore you, as you know.

I can’t imagine a better Papa for my children … except for the part where you sneak them soda and french fries.  But hey, nobody’s perfect.

Happy birthday, Dad. I love you.