The first time my dad said "I love you" to me on the phone will stick with me forever. It had been a few years since moving to Seattle and neither of us had that thing that makes it easy to just pick up the phone to call a friend or loved one and make conversation.

In person, we share that quality that allows people to feel at ease with us. Our phone calls usually led to stifled conversations about the weather, that aikido thing I did, how well work is going, or doctors appointments. The conversations that veered toward relationships and marriage and children and ultimately the heartfelt "I love you", are ones that I can remember and I know I was loved by the guy I call "Dad".

My dad was a joker and a storyteller. He was someone everyone knew and said hi to. He was a fixture in the small blue-collar town in New Jersey, where he owned his restaurant for 40 years. He would walk around the restaurant and start conversations, remember who and what happened with customers, whether they were 3x per weekers or once-a-monthers. It's why last year at his funeral, the mayor of the town offered and provided a police escort for the funeral procession. And why employees who couldn't make it to the funeral stood outside and cried while the Hearst drove by one last time for him to say goodbye to one of his proudest accomplishments.

It's been a year now since his passing and I found the mourning to be missing sorrow. It's hard to feel sorrow when I can still feel his spirit is strong with us. I know he'd want to be noticed, loved, appreciated, and even missed a little, but I also know that he would want us to live our own lives to the fullest, and so I try.

I don't know that I'll ever understand how he was able to survive and live with the experiences of his life: leaving a wife and family in Ukraine as a young man unwilling to fight for the Nazis, surviving WWII Europe one day at a time to eventually live to see the end of the war, learning of a son he could not go back to, and making it to the US with nothing but some dignity and his willingness to work hard. What I do know and understand is that he enjoyed life to the fullest. He loved working, building things, and fixing things. He loved his accomplishments. He loved being with his family and friends.

And with 55 years, a war, and a different language separating us, while frustrating conversations about the same things were more common than not, the words "I love you," spoken from the heart and through the telephone, carry with them the most simple and clear message of all: love who you are and be proud of the person you are. 

Dad, thanks for teaching me about being a man. Thanks for teaching me generosity. Thanks for teaching me how to love unconditionally. I'm proud of who I am and who I am becoming.

I hope someday I can find the words to tell his story more eloquently. For today, I'll remember his love for family, food, and friends. I raise my glass to you, dad. Thanks for showing me part of the way.

Stanley Rawrysz
Jan 10, 1922 - Aug 2, 2010