What I know...

This was written by a good friend of mine. He was nice enough to share it. Forgive the punctuation!

I remember the day as if it were yesterday, that day in late November as I sat by my daddy's hospital bed waiting for the fast approaching end of his life. His 84 years had been lived to the fullest. I had always thought he'd out live me. he was always so strong, so enduring. a strange chance of fate delivered him a lethal blow, a simple change of a prescription, that caused a deadly reaction that shut down his lungs. what the enemy in world war 11 couldn't do, what the hepatitis couldn't do, what the ditch cave in couldn't do, what the high voltage wire couldn't do,what even old age couldn't do, a simple change of medicine did in only a few weeks. he went from climbing up in a tree stand at 4am to hunt deer to the intensive care unit in less than 3 weeks. as i stood by his bed holding his large hands i recalled that it was those same hands that i had hung onto when learning to walk, that lifted me so i could climb that tree in the back yard, that pulled the sling shot back for me to shoot at the bottle. It was those same hands that held me up when trying to swim, that threw me into the air so i could make a big slash in the lake. it was even those same hands that swatted my bottom when i had blatantly disobeyed him but only on a few occasions. it was from this man that i learned most about life. i learned if you want friends you have to be a friend, not to just a few but to anyone who needs one, regardless of status or position. i went to church and heard about the golden rule, but it was at home with my dad that i learned what it was to live it. i learned pretense is just so much bull, that sweet tea is to be savored as the delicacy that it is, and that you eat what you kill or give it away, never ,ever waste that which nature provides. i learned that searching for arrow heads and pottery scraps was a way to learn about those whose land we had taken and whose way of life we had destroyed for our own selfish greed. i learned that hard work is necessary if any thing is worthwhile. i learned that holding grudges is just so much wasted energy.forgive, and move on.let them worry about it. i learned what unconditional love was. You don't have to agree, understand and be anywhere on the same page, just accept for who you are, not what you do. i learned that God was so much bigger than even the church folks thought, especially when they were fussing about something silly. God didn't care about such, but did care about how we treated one another. That was the important thing. as i watched the life slip out of his bodyI knew that an era had past., so much of what was right with me was because of him. Ididn't adopt his sometimes salty language, but sometimes wished I had, for it says it better than my college educated words ever do. he was one of those who always knew what his duty was and always did it.bigger than life sometimes, fun, funny, bold, shocking, but always so loving and caring and giving. so much of what i believe about life ,people,honor,duty, compassion and love, i learned from him.especially that life is a glorious adventure, that has to be lived, every day because you never know when a simple change in something as small as a prescription can change everything