In Praise of MY Father

I remember the first time I saw my father as a person instead of just my dad.  I must have been around six years old and my dad was a counselor for the summer at a local Easter Seals camp.  One day he took me with him to the camp and I got to witness him taking care of other people’s children. We all went swimming together and I remember him holding another little girl in the water. She was in a wheel chair and I don’t think she would have been able to swim on her own. I don’t remember being jealous, I just remember seeing the smile on her face and realizing that my dad could be important to someone besides me.

As the years went on I witnessed my dad’s importance to other people again and again.  My junior year of high school was a tough one, my grades were falling and I wasn’t happy with many parts of my life. At the time, my father was a school administrator of the Philadelphia school system, he brought me for a tour of the High School of Performing Arts. I was looking at the school to potentially transfer to.  (o.k. Fame was my favorite show and I had visions of dancing on cafeteria table tops singing Hot Lunch).  I stayed there for a day and one of the
students was showing me around. We were out on the roof for lunch (no, there was no dancing.) and she said, “Mr. Ort is your father? Wow, you are so lucky!”

“Lucky,” I thought. “Me?”

Finally, I remember a time when I was in college. My dad had been elected to my former district’s school board. The school district was facing a difficult time and was trying to decide if they should build an additional high school splitting the high school into two – or to increase the size of the current high school and make it one very large school. My father was
the deciding vote. I remember being home from college and discussing his decision with him. He was torn over what do and was receiving a lot of pressure from people in the town (including anonymous phone calls.)  I watched him struggle with a decision that was going to affect so many children in the area. He talked it over with me – for one of the first time seeing me as an adult – and eventually he cast his vote in favor of building a new high school. I admired him for being able to make a difficult and potentially unpopular decision.

So this Father’s day – I’d like to thank all the fathers out there – my husband, (who is a terrific father to our children) fathers of my children’s friends, moms who are both mothers and fathers to their children and uncles who step in as fathers – but especially to my own father –I am lucky to have you as a father.

Have a great memory about your father? I’d love to hear about it. Post it below!