I remember when....

Happy Father's Day! I'm so thankful to have a good dad. But today, I couldn't help but think of the people I know who don't have a father to love. I have a friend who just had her father's funeral yesterday, a friend who doesn't know anything about his father, a mother who's father remarried and couldn't have anything to do with his daughter, and a father who's father died when he was only seven years old. So as my family and I sat down to eat a delicious dinner, and in the spirit of this fine day, I asked my father what he remembered about his father. He remembered what his father did, work wise and such, where he lived with his father, even when they took his father away in an ambulance for the last time. But he couldn't seem to remember any interaction with his father, no little personality traits, nothing. Ya, kind-of a downer so we switched over to things we remember from earlier days with our father. There were a few little things we remembered but, unfortunately, there wasn't that many things. My father-figure is always working! He always has and I saw in his face today, as we couldn't recall very many memories with him in them, that he regrets it. I love my father. More than he'll ever know. He works so hard to keep his family full of girls happy and alive. I will always be thankful for him. But I thought of my future family. Thought of my future husband, and said a little prayer to myself that he is different than my father, and that I myself will never be like that. I know the things I worry about right now (clothes, facebook, what to say to this boy, money, etc) are nothing, mean nothing. Who I am, what I do, the way I act, are the things people will remember about me and I want them to be things that matter, things that could change me, someone else, or the world for that matter.
My father got a warning today and I give you the same warning; watch what you do because people will remember...or won't.