Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Emotional Time Capsule

This weekend I went up to the Northern California wine country with my parents to visit an old college friend of my dads. I initially expected to just have a relaxing trip and see northern California with a native guide, but I ended up seeing something much more special.
My Dad only sees or hears from his friend Dan once every year or so, and while they are both aware of the on goings of each others lives they don’t see the day to day changes. They haven’t witnessed first hand each other’s emotional growth and change that they both have had since college. My dad helped raise both me and my brother. He has had a few career changes and has moved 3 times. While underneath it all he is the same person he was in college he has matured with time like we all do. Dan now has 3 children one in college and 2 others that are young. He helps run a very successful business with his wife…
You know when you are great friends with some one when you see them after a long time and it doesn’t feel like you were ever apart. I think this is because when good friends get together after a long time they regress back to the way they were when they saw each other all the time. I’ve noticed this in myself and others before and my dad and Dan were no different. When the two of them got together it was like they immediately reverted back to the way they were in college. Their humor got a little more crass and their adventurous through caution to the wind nature returned in full force.
For example while in college my dad and his friend were big hunters, and while they are both big hunters today their tactics are slightly different. When they were younger if they saw something they wanted they just went and took it. Today they usually recognize and follow most federal and state laws. But while on this trip Dan spotted a group of Quail running down the street. My Dad and Dan leapt to go get a gun and proceeded to stalk them through the upper class suburban neighborhood of Santa Rosa.
The funny thing is while the two of them were concocting these crazy plans both of their wives were right there to be like “Oh no you are not” and “After you pick up the kids” and sometimes just plain “No”. What I was seeing is a side of my dad that I never really got to see before. I was witnessing his youth.

Not only was this just interesting to see but it gave me some incite into my father that I hadn’t had before. By watching him I could now more than ever clearly see where my sense of humor, outlook on life, and adventurous attitude came from. I am more like my father than I ever knew. I’ve known it for a while; this weekend helped reinforced the fact that my father is not only my parent, but one of my best friends.

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