Meet My Dad.

No, that’s not my dad – that’s me. I was just going to post a bunch of pics of my Dad in honour of fathers day, however, I was super inspired/moved by LA’s father’s day post that I decided to expand on my photos and tell you little bit about my pops. So, meet my dad:He likes to ruin almost every picture that he is in, including serious family photos. My mom is worried when her grandchildren are looking through the pictures they will think that my dad is a relative that we got out of the nursing or group home every time we got together. Seriously sometimes with the faces he makes you can’t help but wonder if that’s where he really belongs . . .

He used to take me on adventures in far off places (aka the bush like 15 minutes away) to hunt for salamanders and other woodland creatures.

He could be in a crowd of 100,000 people, but all he has to do is whistle and I know he’s there. He takes amazing photos (including this one of me and my younger brother). There are so many great photos of me and my siblings because my dad had his camera around a lot of the time when we were growing up. I have amazing photos to look through and to scrap with and at least 75% of those are because of him. I am so so grateful for that.

He is the reason I got a buzz-cut with a rat-tail in kindergarten – I wanted to be just like him. I had you braid mine just like you braided yours. Neither of us have our rat-tails anymore, although mom still has mine in a plastic baggy. He loves my mom with all of his heart and teaches me everyday how to treat women by setting an example with her.

He is an amazing gardener and knows a ton about flowers. His vegetable garden is the best and I know if he had more time our yard would be impeccable (its good now, but if he had more time it would be better).

He is forever correcting my grammar and he always helped me with my homework. He taught me to reply to “How are you?” with “I am well” not “I am good” and you distinguish between desert and dessert because with dessert you always want a second helping (referring to the extra ‘s’ of course).

He is insanely smart and I think sometimes he wishes he could have gone down a different career path (I personally think he would have made a great doctor so does my mom) but if he did he wouldn’t be where he is today, and maybe wouldn’t have been around as much as he was when we were growing up.

He is seriously a jack of all trades. For some it may disappear with age – but to this day I seriously doubt that there is something my dad can’t do. He had an afro in college and wanted to pierce his ear but didn’t because he probably would have been kicked out of Bible college. To this day he sometimes wears a clip on earring. (I don’t have a good picture of either of these. gaaah!)

He was and still is my ultimate superhero. One of my earliest memories of him is at a New Years family get together at my grandmas when one of my cousins fell through the ice on the pond and my dad went in after him.

He is an amazingly talented musician and he plays guitar so so well. He also sings and can play a little bit on the piano as well and he knows a ton about theory. I have some musical talent which I probably get from him, but I would give anything for even half of the talent and knowledge he has. He inspires me to play my guitar more, and sit down at the piano. This is probably one of my favourite things about him.

Me and my dad don’t always get along very well and we don’t have the closest father-son relationship ever. We are so similar to one another that we often butt heads on a variety of topics when we have opposing views but we are working on it everyday, and even so I would never ever replace my dad for anyone else.

Father’s day is always hard for him since he lost his dad (my poppa) 15 years ago. (that is him – and is also another amazing photo taken by my dad). I don’t remember a lot about him but what I do remember, I see in my dad. I am told by my mom and my aunts and uncles and grandma that my dad is so so similar to my poppa. My dad is forever telling stories about Poppa and I am grateful for that.

With that, I want to to say Happy Father’s Day to this sweet little boy who turned out to be an amazing husband, father, and man of God.

xo jer.