Friends
I hope it was a wonderful Father’s Day for all the fathers and grandfathers out there. A good father is an incredible blessing, and I have been blessed with the best. So for my sweet Daddy, I’m sending a sweet story of a precious childhood memory, one that may bring a smile, and perhaps, a happy tear or two.
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““A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.”
John 13:34 – NIV
Mama was headed to Hawaii, and I was pouting. Mama was going to see Daddy, and I simply could not understand why I couldn’t go!
Daddy had been gone such a long time, longer than he had ever been gone before. The worst part was that he wasn’t coming home anytime soon.
Mama had stroked my blonde curls as she explained that we had to wait another six months until November, all the way until Thanksgiving, for Daddy to come home for good. That’s why Mama was going to meet Daddy in Hawaii. The Army gave the soldiers a one-week vacation from the war when they had been in Vietnam for six months. They called it “R & R.”
That made good sense to me. The soldiers needed a break from fighting. As an Army brat, I knew a lot about soldiers. I had heard my father and his friends talk about fighting, missions, and troop training.. I didn’t understand it all, but I knew my Daddy had to go far away to a place called Vietnam and help fight for the people there. I knew my Daddy was a Special Forces paratrooper, even a jungle expert. “Airborne all the way!” Was a chant he taught me to say. My Daddy was tough, and strong, and super-cool, and as far as I was concerned, he walked on water! I understood why he had to go, but I missed him so.
When Mama started talking about R & R in Hawaii, I thought it was a great idea. Hawaii was a beautiful place. I had seen it on TV. I thought it would be so cool to see the beaches, and the flowers, and the ladies dancing in the grass skirts. I was all excited about the idea until Mama explained that I couldn’t go.
“But why, Mama? Why can’t I go?”
“Mama’s big, brown eyes stared into my own as she explained, “the boys and girls don’t get to go. The Army won’t let them. Only the Mommies get to go”
“But why, Mama?”
Thus far, no one had been able to answer that question to my seven-year-old satisfaction. I was still pouting a bit by the time my grandparents and I watched Mama board the airplane for Hawaii, but the fact that I got to spend the week on the farm with Grand and Grandmama made me feel better about it all. Mama had promised that Daddy would call on the telephone and talk to me, and that made me feel better too.
Maybe it was a way to distract me from my brooding, but the trip I made to the Western Auto with Grand certainly changed the course of the week. . It was there that I spied the hot pink bicycle, and it was the prettiest bicycle I had ever seen. It had high handlebars and a white banana seat. It was so cool, and I wanted it so bad I could taste it!
I must have talked incessantly about it that week, because even my serious-minded schoolteacher grandmother noticed my obsession. Grandmama wasn’t exactly a touchy-feely kind of grandmother, but she didn’t miss much, and the sun rose and set in her grandchildren.
I remember so clearly the night Daddy was supposed to call from Hawaii. Grand and Grandmama sat rocking in their favorite rockers in the kitchen beside the old gas stove, while I pranced around the room, barely able to contain my excitement. That’s when Grandmama spoke up with a suggestion that sent my heart racing. “You know, Anita, when your Daddy calls, why don’t you just ask him if you can have the hot pink bicycle? Why don’t you just ask him and see what he says?”
Her suggestion surprised me, and I watched as an amused smile spread across her usually quite-serious face. I heard Grand let out a merry chuckle and add, “Yeah, girl, why don’t you ask him that?”
The minutes ticked by at a snail’s pace, but finally, the phone rang. Grandmama answered with a grin in her voice as she spoke to her beloved middle son. Then it was my turn!
“Hey Daddy!”
“Hey Doll!” My father’s deep voice echoed across the phone line with the special name he always reserved for me.
“Daddy, I miss you! You’ve been gone a long time. How is Hawaii?” I listened happily to my father as we chatted on for a bit. Then with an encouraging nod from Grandmama who was standing beside me, I popped the big question.
“Daddy, there’s this bicycle at the Western Auto. It’s hot pink, and it has high handlebars and a white banana seat. Daddy, can I have it?”
I heard my father erupt into a classic-Daddy chuckle. “Yes, Doll, you can have it.”
Unbridled seven-year-old joy erupted from my end of the line! I don’t recall all the words we spoke thereafter, but I do recall Grandmama standing there nodding, a mile-wide grin spreading across her face. When the call ended, I blurted out, “Grandmama, he said I could have it! He said I could have the bicycle!”
Grandmama just stood there grinning. With a knowing nod of her snowy-white curls, she responded, “Yes, I thought he might.”
I did get that hot pink bicycle, and it was super-cool! It didn’t make up for Daddy being gone, but it did keep me entertained throughout the summer and fall until the glorious day when my Daddy stepped off that airplane, and Mama and I fell into his open arms. That hot pink bicycle was something special, but when my Daddy lifted my feet off the tarmac and twirled me around in the air, I knew there was no better gift in the whole-wide world than to have my Daddy come home to me.
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“By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.””
John 13:35 – NIV
PRAYER
O Loving Father, thank You for the love of good fathers and grandfathers. Thank You for the fine men who serve as positive role models for children. They make such a difference in our lives, and the fatherly love of those good men remind us of the limitless and unconditional love You have for each of us. Lord, let us love one another well.
In the Precious Name of Jesus, we pray,
Amen
Father’s Day Blessings,
Anita
-APS 6/16/2025
Faith Beyond Sight 