Dad

I’m incredibly blessed to have a dad whose life path has taught me many valuable lessons in following my heart instead of following trends, money, job titles, or status. He’s led a simple, mostly drama free life (impressive considering a wife, 3 sisters, 2 daughters and, of course, the cats…) doing what he loves, being helpful with what he can be helpful with, and enjoying the people around him.

I’m always very grateful that my dad is, and always has been, someone who I look up to, respect and trust to always be fair, responsible, do the right thing and make funny jokes.

Even though my dad cannot be relied upon to deliver a phone message, he’s the most reliable person I know and always there to help with any situation, no matter what. He’ll always do the right thing, make the most logical choice, fix whatever is broken, and do the maintenance in a timely manner to keep things looking great and working well. He’s an excellent role model of working hard, working smart, relaxing well and making time for his passions.

He’s an incredible musician (playing the piano, pipe organ, classical guitar and several other instruments), has an exceptional singing voice, is an avid bird watcher, fabulous photographer, and makes a darn great breakfast. He was cycling to work and for fun/exercise way before the hipsters & spandex kits existed. He loves classical music, reading sci fi, British novels, the funnies and books of movie reviews, and sometimes watches terrible movies “just to see how bad they are.”

My mom always says it’s great to have a handy man and my dad is handy across the board. He can fix cars, tv’s, stereos, toilets, pottery, garage doors; you name it. He cleans the house, the gutters, the yard, the cars and even the garage sometimes. My parents have always been a great parenting team, as well as very compatible couple. I’ve never heard them speak ill of each other; they are incredibly generous, civic-minded and fair people.

My dad is so brilliant that it’s hard for me to comprehend the level he’s able to think on when it comes to engineering. He started a company in Silicon Valley in the early 80’s, way before it was such a cool/trendy thing to do. The coolest thing about that, I think, is that he realized he didn’t want to be an executive or a manager, he wanted to be an engineer, designing, solving problems, building instruments. I get that totally and applaud that choice.

My full name, Abigail, is a Hebrew name meaning father’s joy. It’s a blessing to have a happy father everyday and on Father’s Day!