{"id":270,"date":"2019-11-06T07:15:11","date_gmt":"2019-11-06T12:15:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tomme-stevenson.com\/website\/?p=270"},"modified":"2020-01-18T11:43:54","modified_gmt":"2020-01-18T16:43:54","slug":"my-fathers-passing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tomme-stevenson.com\/website\/my-fathers-passing\/","title":{"rendered":"My Father’s Passing"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This post is off topic but important\nto me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>
\n

<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Last night one of the most influential\npeople in my life passed away. It was my father, he was 93, and he was an\nabsolutely incredible man \u2014 one of those once in a century type people. To his\nlast days, he still charmed those to whom he talked, even when his dementia\nclouded the memory of who they were from his mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t want to bore you with my\ncomplete admiration of who he was.  I do\nwant to reveal some of his lessons to me. He taught me the most important\nlesson you should learn about commitment was not keeping it; this was absolute,\nbut when and how to make it in the first place. \nIf one makes the right commitment, maintaining it is easy. Once you\ncommit, you keep it no matter how high the cost. That is why making it is more\nimportant than keeping it. It is in the making that you set the stage for\nkeeping.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He taught me that life was not meant\nto be fair or just, but there is still a joy to be found. Finding joy in life\nrequires you to look past the pain and disappointment to see the learning and the\nprogress. Falling and failing were part of the process and didn\u2019t define who\nyou are.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Work was a life long endeavor. Finding\nyour passion was critical for sustaining this effort. Passion changed work into\njoy. It was something in which you took pride. You cannot sustain satisfaction\nin an endeavor without a passion for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I learned that the most crucial thing in life is love. He was not a man to hug or kiss or even say I love you. He was a man who showed it and lived it every day. Actions were the foundation of character, not words. From this man married to my mother for 72 years, I learned a love that was profound and indescribable. That love brings me great pain today. He was my rock and my castle on a hill; he was all that I hoped to be. He made me proud to be his son.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He rode the rails as a migrant worker\nat 15. He lied about his age and went to war at 17. Without a high school\ndiploma, he passed his college boards and soon graduated a civil engineer.\nThroughout college, he studied, worked full time as a bartender at night, and\nsupported three kids and a wife \u2014 all of this he did with a sense of passion,\npurpose, and obligation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He will be greatly missed by me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At his passing, I want to take a moment to honor the greatest man in my life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[11],"class_list":["post-270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-stones","tag-happiness"],"yoast_head":"\nMy Father's Passing - 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