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The Lessons of Dad...

...About growing up...

Over the years, dad has taught me a lot about life. In fact, he would teach me something anytime I was willing to listen. He was very religious and very industrious. But even though he was a hard worker, he never achieved what he wanted in worldly riches. He never saw his big dreams come true and I believe he died feeling he had failed. But besides his love of work, family, the Scriptures and the Lord, dad, through all of his struggles, taught me many great lessons about life itself.

One of the greatest lessons was the meaning of intestinal fortitude. For I never saw my dad when he didn’t get up ...one more time than he fell. No matter what disappointment came his way, dad withstood it and began again the next day. You just couldn’t get dad to give up. To him, "If you can still move, then you can still move forward." That’s just the way dad believed, was and lived. It’s also what he taught everyone of us–his children. As a result of the lessons of dad, each one of us have done very well in life with nice, well furnished homes, nice vehicles, secure financial futures and most importantly, we are all very, very strong in the gospel.

Today, I fear we live with such prosperity, such ease of life, that quitting what we don’t like or that seems hard, is not only easy, but socially acceptable. In my youth, I was put in "remedial reading" and "remedial math" classes quite often. I’m not very good at math and I’m not very good at reading. Even now, if I don’t have time to read something two or three times, I don’t like reading in public. But dad would never let the teachers label me with a label or say that I had a reading disability. To him, if I was in a foot race with 100 other people and I came in near the end, I wouldn’t say I had a running disability, I just didn’t run as fast as they did. So the same was true with my reading. I just didn’t read as fast. Dad’s answer to this was the same answer to every other problem in life. "Work harder and overcome it." He would always help me, never label me, but his bottom line answer was always, "Work harder and overcome it." I always hated that answer.

After about seven or eight years into my career, I started going into home after home where the children were being labeled and medicated because of the brand new diseases of the late twentieth century, "ADHD and EHD." Ones that were not there for us or our parents or our pioneers or our founding fathers or any of the people who lived for the past 6000 years. I became more suspicious when CNN announced that 80% of the world’s Ritalin was being consumed by the country that represented only 7% of the world’s population. The US. The vast majority going to our children. My suspicions heightened when I learned that the pill manufacturing companies were spending as much money on advertising as they were on research and development. As a street cop, I’ve talked to many ADHD and EHD labeled kids. When I did, I took the time to teach them the lessons of dad.

The most well known, talked about, celebrated and revered general in American history is George Washington. What’s not so well known is that he wasn’t a good tactician and he lost more battles than he won. But the most important thing is, he stayed vigilant to the end and he won the last battle, leaving behind a great country. My dad was the same way. He wasn’t a good tactician and he lost more battles than he won. But the most important thing is, he stayed vigilant to the end and he won the last battle, leaving behind a great family. Though I didn’t always see eye to eye with him when I was growing up, as I matured I have realized how much he means to me and how grateful I am that I am his son. For countless times in my life I have drawn on and taught ...the lessons of dad.                                                                                                               Samuel    www.LDSCOPS.com


 

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