Today,May 30th, is my dad’s “would-be” 70th birthday… He passed away exactly 2 weeks ago today, almost making it to this huge milestone birthday. Today, along with my mom, 3 of my 5 siblings, 1 sister-in-law, my husband, and 5 of the 10 grandchildren we celebrated his birthday and shared many warm thoughts and memories of him.
I miss him dearly.
I took the above photo of him about 3 years ago… My dad was a hard working man. A machinist, to be exact, for most of his life and owning his own shop for the past 20 years or so. I remember when I told him that I wanted to do a “photo shoot” with him working at the shop as my focus, he laughed a little bit and happily consented. I’m sure he thought I was crazy for wanting to do such a session! But, in all honesty, this session for me has been hands-down my favorite session ever. Not because I had a great camera – because I didn’t – and certainly not because I had some fancy new lens to try out – because, actually, my lens at this point was pretty lame . This session was my favorite because it was one I had been wanting to do since I first had the urge to try my hand at photography.
I had so much fun that day working with him… I remember him laughing at himself when I made him pose with a pencil behind his ear and a mug of coffee and blueprints on his desk, as if he were hard at work doing something really important! At one point, I even made him pose with a phone to his ear! He got such a laugh outta doing that! Even though, I’m sure I made him feel so silly doing some pretty goofy poses, he went along with it all with no complaints. And, to top it all off, we got some really awesome photos of him that day (like my favorite above!), as well as some funny ones too when I made him pose! I’m so glad he and I did that together… Fond, fond memories in my heart forever.
Happy 70th Birthday, Daddy! I love you!!
