Tribute to My Dad Part 4

Dad, Uncle Randy, Nathan and I

(Back before the wooden boat needed bad repairing!)

I couldn’t remember my Dad without talking about our times and memories of camp. Camp was such a special place for my Dad, and he shared its specialness with his family. My Dad, by luck of his genes didn’t like to lose, and in turn passed that gene onto me. We used to play a lot of games together, backgammon, Owaree, cribbage, Quinto (a great math game!), and many, many others. One thing about playing with games with my Dad, if you beat him you earned it – there were never any just because wins, if you beat him you knew you’d done something right! I don’t let people win either. I beat Brian so bad and so many times at backgammon on our honeymoon that he to this day will not play with me.

My Dad, Jason and I on the Porch Snowmen at Camp in April

My Dad was an awesome water-skier, at least in my eyes. From as long as I can remember I wanted to water-ski as well as my Dad could. He taught me how, and a long process and an injury finally got me up and skiing. The injury came one day when I was using the big wooden board. Dad told Nathan and me that we couldn’t water-ski until we had mastered the board. One of my favorite things to do on the board was get on the outside of the wake as we went in a circle. Well this one particular day, I had the rope to the board wrapped around my arms and was digging really, really hard on the outside of a corner. I was flying (not literally but it sure felt like it).

Me on the "wake" board

I’d made it almost all the way around, and was moving way fast, and the board caught funny and down I went, with the board/boat dragging me behind and me screaming the whole way. My Dad figured out that I was still “attached” and as quick as he could stopped the boat (it was pretty darn quick!). I got untangled and he came around to see what had happened and make sure I was okay. With rope burn all the way up both my arms and some serious pulled muscles there was no way I was going to get back on the board, so Dad and Nathan helped me get into the boat (mostly Dad lifting me out of the water and over the side of the boat, because I hurt to bad to help). It was a long trip back to camp, and my Dad felt terrible. To this day every time since, I’ve managed to hurt something on that stupid board. The last time I got hurt, my Dad and I decided maybe I should just stay away from it!

One of the last boat rides my Dad took before he died.

After finishing the "refurbish" project