I've always thought that my Dad and Harrison Ford had a bit in common, ever since the first time my Mom let me stay up late to watch Star Wars with my Dad and Han blew out the console on the detention level and blamed it on a communication malfunction.
Harrison Ford just always had this way of being the hero in a kind of gentle, quiet, unassuming way. You knew he was the hero, and he'd step in and save the day after everyone else had mucked it up. You knew it, he knew it, that was it. Dad would always save the day, and it would always be no big deal, just a little flip of a switch or a jiggle of this or that, and it would be fine. All my life, I've been able to count on my Dad being able to fix anything and make it look like no big deal.
Harrison Ford appears to be like my Dad. However, he doesn't have the luxury of anonymity like my Dad does, though. Harrison Ford is, well, Harrison Ford. When he flies his chopper around, it makes the front page of CNN. When my Dad does something equally heroic, it doesn't make CNN news. My Dad has the luxury of being better and more awesome than a movie star without having to put up with the flak that someone like Harrison Ford does. I'm sure my Dad would enjoy flying a chopper around the Montana badlands picking up lost hikers from time to time. I'm even more sure he enjoys the life he has built for himself and his family more than Harrison Ford enjoys his life.
My Dad is pretty darn heroic. He's done some really incredible things in my life, an here's what I think I know, but I learn something new about him every day:
Dad started out working wood. He has my curly hair, and I can only imagine what Dad looked like with sawdust all in his hair. Must have been hard on the drains, all I can say. He moved on to radios, and worked for Oklahoma Gas and Electric. He started off as a radio man, and he still knows everything about old radios. It's really fun to ask my Dad to spend a few minutes with an old radio - I have no clue how they work but I actually understand and can follow along and learn something new when Dad explains it. Dad is the hero, after all. I'm not exactly sure what Dad's official position is these days, but I know he's responsible for lots of money that goes into making massive wind farms and the like, so I know its money well spent. There's a phrase: "Find something you love to do, and you'll never work a day in your life." I think Dad is in a spot where he can do something he's really good at and is really passionate about, and I'm really proud and happy for my Dad. When your Dad complains to you about how they're penalizing him for consistently coming in under budget, you know your Dad is worthy of a hero story.
Everyone grows up with this ideal that their Mom is an angel and their Dad is a hero. I was blessed with a heroic father and an angelic mother, and I can't thank them enough.
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