Its a funny thing that an inexpensive watch from the local Wal-Mart lets me know that my dad is still here.
I was born in Sherman, Texas, and raised here during the tumultuous 60s and 70s. My dad started working for the Sherman post office the year I was born. It was the only job I ever knew him to have, all of my life. My dad was pretty strict on the three of us kids as we grew up.
He ‘made’ us go to church. He let us know what behavior he’d tolerate and what he wouldn’t tolerate. I was the last of three children all born just three years apart (bless my mother’s heart). Being just 354 days difference between me and my older sister, you could easily figure out that I wasn’t exactly ‘planned’ to arrive when I was born.
Being as one who was born outside of the plan, I found my courage to be a bit of a rebel and even stand up against much of what my dad wanted me to do. Especially in my teenage years. I waged verbal and willful war with my dad.
Sometimes I wonder if it was insanity on my part or pure courage to challenge him regarding his strict discipline and my determined spirit to not want to play along. Nonetheless, even though he always got his way, it was not without a challenge from my smart mouth and stubborn attitude.
My dad did something, when I was a sophomore at Sherman High School, that more or less blew my mind. I had just received my driver’s license and my dad sat down and had a talk with me. He told me, “Mike, you’re 6’3” tall, you have your driver’s license and I want you to know that I’m not going to hassle you about going to church, about coming in whenever you want and about much of your behavior. I can’t handle you anymore.’”
I interpreted that to be my ticket to freedom. I was free to grow my hair as long as I wanted and hang out with whoever I chose. I could come and go as I pleased and do whatever mischief I decided was fun and exciting to do.
The funny thing is, that very act of my dad ‘letting me go’ was the biggest turnaround in my life. I suddenly had an epiphany that in a few years, I was going to be 18 years old and out on my own. I straightened up, started attending church on my own and later became a minister for 15 years at the very church that my dad had forced me attend.
My dad was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in the early 90s. He rapidly got to the place where he couldn’t function in any normal fashion and ended up in a series of nursing homes in the area. It was when he was in a facility at Whitewright, Texas, that my sister and I began conducting a weekly inspirational chapel service for all of the residents and patients there.
One day, I was there with him alone and he asked me to buy him a new watch after we had lunch. As was usual in our relationship, I challenged him and asked him, “Dad, why do you need a watch? There are clocks everywhere around here and you aren’t going anywhere. Why, for heavens sakes, do you need a watch?” His only answer was, “Mike, you never know why I might need a watch.”
As simple as that conversation may have seemed at the time, it has taken on a significance that I would have never dreamed of.
I took him from the nursing home that day and we went to have lunch at one of his favorite places, ‘The Rib’, east of Denison, Texas. After we finished eating, I drove him to the Denison Wal-Mart and bought my dad a new watch. He insisted that he go in and pick it out.
It has been over 5 years now since my dad transitioned from this life to the next one. On November 7, 2002, I was taking an insurance class at my church when my secretary called me into the hallway. She informed me that my dad had just died. It was no surprise even though you can never be prepared for those words. We buried his mortal remains on Monday, November 11th.
Pat Dannel, of Dannel Funeral Home in Sherman, allowed me into the room with dad’s earthly shell the day after his death. She gave me an envelope that possessed the few personal belongings that he had at his death. The watch I bought him was among those possessions.
For whatever reason, dad had the alarm on the watch to go off at 3 p.m. everyday. I put it in a drawer in my office at my home. Till this very day, over 5 years after his death, that alarm still goes off every afternoon. While other battery operated watches I own, have had their batteries replaced 2-3 times, that battery has never run down or been replaced.
I am grateful to him for having the wisdom to do what he did in letting me go as a teenager. That very act probably saved my life and allowed me to mature into who I am today. Everyday at 3 p.m., I hear that alarm and know that my dad is still with me. In my heart and mind, I simply smile and say to him, “Yes, I know you’re still here. And yes, dad, you won.” I know now why I bought him THAT watch, that day.
Positive Attitudes 