communications and role models

Every week, unless he's been traveling or we've recently chatted on video-phone, my dad sends me an email. For the last three years or so I have kept copies of each one, although he's been doing this since I moved away from home.

My dad's emails, and letters, are usually in point form. I think he's getting more and more comfortable with email sending, because over the past few years he is getting more and more jokey in them. He also emails my brother, so sometimes we compare notes on the funniest things he's emailed. He's got quite a sense of humour and over the past few years he has discovered that he can actually express it in email, although sometimes he is just inadvertently funny.

From 2001 until 2011, when he passed away, I kept up a somewhat regular correspondence with my dad's brother, Uncle Ike. For reasons no one knows, but which I often ponder (and sympathise with given my own reclusive personality), he had not really spoken to anyone for years and the letters he wrote to me were a rarity. I find it really interesting to compare his long, prosy, descriptive letters to the short ones my dad writes. Their handwriting is a little similar, and they often write about the same things (what they've read, what the weather is like etc) but their styles are completely different. Then again, perhaps that is the difference between writing someone every week and writing them once or twice a year.

My dad's emails are as regular as clockwork, aside from the aforementioned considerations. Without fail, whether or not I've had time to reply to the one from the previous week (or weeks!) I get a new email each Tuesday or Wednesday (I think he still relies on my mum to actually get them sent from the outbox). When I phone home I mostly talk to my mum, and dad is good at sitting in on a video call but not actually setting one up/answering it so were it not for these weekly emails we wouldn't talk as much.

For most of my life my dad has been my hero, or something like that (I'm not really the sort of person to have 'heros' or 'role models'). I'm fortunate that I married a man who loves and respects my father as much as I do, because it means I've never had to compromise on my opinion. Even now that I'm an adult and can see people's weaknesses as well as their strengths, the fact that my dad is human doesn't diminish who he is in my eyes. He's always been a great father--he taught me my first acts of defiance (learning to stick my tongue out), let me make meals of chocolate syrup when mum wasn't home to stop me, and played endless games with me when he was not at work (sleigh rides, wheelbarrow rides, catch, board games, magazine puzzles). We share a love of books, religion, and history which is great, especially when we're on a family vacation as it means no one has veto power on those things.

The Baby is set to make its appearance in about three months. I keep wondering, and occasionally worrying, of what sorts of parents David and I will be. Both of mine are awesome (and listening to others' stories, I'd wager they are better than most!). The one thing I really hope is that the baby grows up to love and respect David as much as I love and respect my dad.