Sunday Story…Father’s Day

This one has been hard for me to write.

I am a Father. I am also a Grandfather. I am not always proud of the father I have been. I wish I would have been more like my father but I wasn’t. In 2011 I wrote this:
http://sunday-stories.blogspot.com/2011/06/sunday-storyhappy-fathers.html
about my dad. If you want to read it, please feel free.

I didn’t spend the kind of time I think, in retrospect, my children deserved and needed but that may just my perception now. In Brittany’s case I was a nonexistent entity. It is an ignominy I bear every day; shame on me that was inexcusable. No matter what I felt, or what happened between the two adults in her life I should have been better than that. I wasn’t and I can’t apologize enough.

My other 3 children had a Father who worked a lot…sometimes 18 hours a day and almost never took vacations. I was driven past the point of excess. It didn’t really serve any of us. On the other hand I still do that…drive myself toward goals and commitments that require unprecedented focus and determination. I just don’t have children living at home, or anyone else for that matter! Except for a cat that only cares if she doesn’t get fed.

Hopefully my children felt loved even though I was absent a lot. Hopefully they got the lessons I wanted to impart about the importance of hard work, doing a job well, service and kindness. Hopefully they learned what good things to do for their children and what mistakes to avoid on their own journeys to parenthood.

Unfortunately our children don’t come with an owner’s manual when they arrive (not that all of us would have read it anyway!) We can only do what we think is best at the time we are doing it, based on the examples we have from our families and the people around us. We learn as we go.

On this Father’s day I want to Thank all my children for turning out so well in spite of me and all my faults and miss-steps over the years. They are all grown up and out in the world doing great things with families of their own. And I want to Thank my father for being who he was as my father.

I love you all of you kids.
And
I love you Dad.

Namaste

John Mariotti
www.crossfit-odyssey.com
www.martialartsnevad.com
www.sunday-stories.blogspot.com
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