.343 | to Hugh Miller III, from Tim Miller
Dear Dad,
It's still hard to believe that you are gone and while I don't have any regrets, there are some things I would like to say to you. We never got to have a real funeral because COVID took that away from us, just like it took you. This isn't a eulogy though, this is message of gratitude and thanks.
You taught me so much during my 47 years on this planet. Some lessons were harder than others and some stuck with me longer than others but all of them had value and impact. In my younger years you weren't around as much because you were working full time while mom stayed home with Chris and me to help us through my first few years.
One of my earliest memories was when we played airplane in the front yard. This was the game where you grabbed our hands and put your feet on our stomach and then lifted our bodies up in the air on your feet and then Titanic-style you let go of our hands and we got to "fly". I recall this being fun, painful, exhilarating, and terrifying as a young child. Despite all of these different feelings I remember making you do it again and again until you finally gave up because you were so tired. Thank you for being the one who taught me how to fly.
As I got older you took on other roles like being the assistant scout master for cub scouts. Even though you were always exhausted after work you showed up and helped us to learn and grow every week. You were never outdoorsy and in fact later in life I recall you saying to a friend at a neighborhood crab feast, "I hate camping but I love my son, so I went". I am not sure who was more relieved when I decided to stop before becoming a boy scout, you or me. In the last few months before you passed away we were talking and you shared that you never liked to play Bridge but you did it because mom loved it. You played once a month with the "bridge club" for years even though you never liked the game, you did it because you loved mom. Thanks for teaching me that we do what's best for those we love, even when it's not what we love.
One of my favorite stories of you is when you and mom traveled to England on vacation and how he tackled that trip. There are two incidents in particular that really stick with me. You were able to visit with my best friend Stu's parents and when you entered their home (my dad as 6'6") you cracked your head on the entryway and almost went down from the impact. You had good humor about it apparently but a lump came on pretty quickly but that didn't stop you from asking for a pint and enjoying the evening. Thank you for showing me that getting hit in the head shouldn't stop you from enjoying a good pint.
The second story was from the tours they took while in England. They took one of those bus tours that went from historical location to historical location for about 9 days. Some days there were 3-4 stops in a day and your tolerance for those was pretty low. Mom came home and told us that you "napped your way across England" and we had to ask what she meant. Apparently, after about 2 historical visits you were done for the day so when the bus would stop and everyone got out you would tell mom to go ahead and you found a park bench and took a nap. The concept that you could get mugged, treated like you were homeless, or something worse never seemed to bother or worry you. I have to be honest, I kept waiting for mom's next photo album to be entitled "Hugh's England Park Bench Tour" but that never happened. Thanks for showing me that here and now is always a good time and place for a nap.
Finally, I think about mom and how she was sick for almost your entire marriage. She was diagnosed with lupus in the late 70s and continued to get other challenging diagnoses the rest of her life. I think about marriages that end because of money, or kids, or falling out of love, or irreconcilable differences and then I think of my parents, especially my dad. You had dreams for your lives that never happened and when I see other people giving up on a marriage I think of you. You stood beside her during some of the most challenging and painful years of her life when lesser men would have left. You learned to do every task in the house and continued to work when she couldn't and did for her what she couldn't do for herself. We had pretty traditional gender roles in our house growing up and I learned a lot from watching you take on all the roles for mom, no matter what was "traditional". I learned so much from watching this and I am not sure I can explain all of the lessons but they have landed and stuck with me. Thank you for showing me what being a partner means, for standing by mom even when it would have been easier to walk away, and for helping me to know that when a partnership is true, there is nothing you won't do for the other person because that's what love is.