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He Didn't Have To Be.....




I haven't blogged much...well, really none!  I liked those days when my blog was anonymous and those who read it didn't really know me.  I can't even seem to find a way for it to stop posting on Facebook. 

But, "writing" is my outlet...it's my way to tell a story.  If one reads or three hundred read it...

Yesterday, my husband's dad passed away. It's a day that my husband has always said that he could not bare.  Here today, we face it.  It's hard.  The pain my husband feels in the pit of his stomach is more than mental or emotional....its a physical pain.


The first time, I met Roland.  He looked at my husband and said "Well, by gosh, you really are dating a "Yankee"." I think in my eyes I have always been a Yankee but even though I am from the wrong
side of the Dixie Line- he has always shown me love.

He was a great husband.  My mother-in-law and father-in-law LOVED each other.  They were inseparable when they were well and inseparable by each other's bedside.  They shared life together..all of it!

But, on my end I saw my father-in-law as a dad to my husband and his siblings.  My husband's biological dad passed away when he was only one.  So Roland came into my husband's life in elementary school.  My husband said he loved him before he even married his mother.  My husband remembers jumping on the bed telling his mom to marry Roland!

Roland taught my husband how to ocean fish and how to play baseball.  Chris loved spending time with him.  He told me he would rush home from school to run errands with Roland. Every birthday, they would go out to breakfast.

Chris told me a story about his 13th birthday.  They went out to eat like any other birthday and ate breakfast.  When the bill came, Roland looked at my husband and asked if he had money to cover his meal. Well, at the age of 13, he didn't bring any.  So my father-in-law proceeded to leave him at the restaurant to work his "part" with the restaurant owner.  A few hours later, Roland picked up my husband.  My husband said as he walked to the car that he was so mad and hurt.  When, he got in the car, my father-in- law looked at him and said, "You are becoming a man...NEVER go anywhere or do anything unless you can pay for it....NEVER rely or think that someone else will take care of you or pay the bill".  It seemed harsh to me but my husband said he never forgot it and it stuck with him. There were quite a few more "lessons" similar to this through his high school years but my Father-In-Law loved him and my husband loved him right back and more!

Through our married life, Roland would just call my husband when NO ONE knew.  They thought he was taking a nap  BUT he was on the phone with my husband.  They were "Father/Son" best friends. Just a few weeks ago, Roland called my husband to tell him that "He loved him and that he was his son." It's almost like he knew that time was fading even when he was not yet sick.

When we got married,my husband insisted that Roland be his best man. He has been his "best man" ever since.

 

Soon, we will be traveling down south and my husband will have to say "goodbye" to his hero, his friend....his dad!

When I first heard this song, I immediately thought of my husband and Father-in-law and I still do... It's called "He Didn't Have To Be..."---today, I dedicate this to my husband and his love for his dad!


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