My 94-year-old Dad died a few hours ago. He was in a senior care facility in Galveston and the last time I saw him was in early Dec. for a Christmas visit. My Dad was a freak of nature in that he lived to be a very old man and no one, at least no one I know, would have predicted his longevity. The last conversation I had with him was three days ago and he struggled to hear me to which I said, “Dad can I have a shrimp dinner delivered?” Ordering UberEats seemed the only thing I knew to do for him that would offer entertainment and happiness. He loved Galveston and he loved shrimp.
As I reflect on life with my father, I’m wondering now how I could have missed so many of his kindnesses. He felt largely absent when I was a child growing up. As a minister, it seemed he was either preaching or getting ready for a sermon or counseling parishioners. When he left the Methodist Church, because the church leadership couldn’t support his efforts to integrate his all-white congregation, he became a civil rights leader in Houston under LBJ. Those years were marked by childhood fears of the KKK burning a cross in our little front yard. I would lie awake at night dreaming up plans to wrap belts or slings under my bed which I would crawl into when the KKK came to kidnap my family. I’d remain undetectable hiding in the slings and could wiggle out and run for help to save my family.
I remember when I started dressing for “the walk” from my car across the parking lot and into the entrance at Lamar High School. I’d be running out our door in the morning and if dad caught me he’d say, “That skirt shows too much, Harriet. Go upstairs and put on a skirt that shows more skirt than leg or you’re not leaving the house.” I felt so mad at the time that I sometimes stuffed the shorter skirt in my purse to change into in the car before making “the walk,” out of his sight. Now all I feel is the love of his fatherhood and protection booming out of his chest on those mornings.
I remember him driving with me from Houston and helping me move into dorms and apartments over my college years at The University of Texas in Austin. One year, I didn't decide to go back to UT until the night before classes started. As the countdown began to get me to college before classes started, he was still in it with me, helping me pack up all of my belongings, driving me to an apartment I had…
