Father’s Day 2021 notes from Danielle….

She’s a deep thinking kinda lady and filled with gratitude…makes me happy…

“Dad… where do I start? You sacrificed so much to lend me the biggest gift of all…

my personal sense of identity, confidence and creative passion for life and the arts. You’ve taught me that a life lived chasing your “bliss”, delaying instant gratification and choosing the road less taken is the most freeing and rewarding way to live. You have handed down your exuberance for the possibilities of life to me, and I can never thank you enough for that. Every time I had my heart broken in life it broke yours too.

You would let me fall and fail because you knew that’s exactly what I needed to go through. Yet, you were and always have been the first to pick me up in life. When I was sick, you fought for me with your whole life and believed in my recovery more than anyone else I know. Thank you.

Whether it’s a coffee trip and drive, driving me to leadership camps growing up or the horse barn every night of my teenage years — it overflows my heart with gratitude when I think about how much you believe in me. You have gracefully handed down your fiery ambition, relentless passion and openness to opportunity to me. You have taught me that once you choose to see life this way, the world has infinite possibilities.

I’m SO proud to have a father who relentless believes in everything I did. You gracefully nurtured every creative & entrepreneurial streak within me. Every bold step and action i take to this day is because of you. When you’re not being a remarkable, inspiring & ambitious father, I love your typical father side. I love the silly jokes you crack, the way you offer to make the best (slightly greasy – but awesome) eggs on Sunday mornings.

I love how you will scare mom by hiding in this closet and I and that makes us feel loved. I’ll never forget that. I think you’ll probably do that when you’re 90 years old and I’m worried someone will crack a hip. Lol. I love that you pick the BEST movies and take the time to always ask me the typically awkward questions about my life that others would avoid just so you can really know how I am doing and feeling. That is so damn cool.

There’s a quote from the Velveteen Rabbit which you coincidentally used to read to me when I was 9 years old. If you remember, in the book a child deeply loves her stuffed rabbit. With each passing year, the rabbit grows a little more raggedy and he quickly learns that as he gets older, his heart cracks open more deeply and he becomes more “real”: “Real isn’t how you are made”, said the Skin Horse. ‘It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real … You become. It takes a long time.

That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand. Sure, you have a few more wrinkles and you’ve lost a little more hair over the years — but you certainly have not lost your beautiful mind, generous nature, nor your zest for life. Please never change okay. I truly believe you are getting better with age and I’m undoubtedly in full belief that there is no other man I would have to be my father in this lifetime. Thank you for all you do.

With all my love, Boonie OX”

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