I joke that my dad raised me like his firstborn son.
I was taught how to fish, hunt and drive all before I turned 10. I grew up watching football religiously, understanding early on the importance of turnovers on third downs. Alternative rock and George Strait’s greatest hits are essentials in my Spotify library.
They say we become like those we surround ourselves with. And when I really stop and take a good look, I can see just how much of me is shaped by him.
His Lore Runs Deep
Not only am I his identical twin (my poor mom-truly an incubator), my father’s isms echo in my adult life more than I ever expected. The way I organize things. The way I (try) to walk into a room. The way I tell stories like I’m building a campfire (see: this blog).
My dad is a war hero. In 2003, he deployed with the 82nd Airborne Division in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom, with additional deployments in 2004 with the First Calvary Division to Baghdad and in 2008 commanding Charlie Company MEDEVAC. When he wasn’t at home playing catch and sitting through ballet recitals, he oversaw medical evacuation missions to rescue the wounded as a MEDEVAC aviator. Nearly 2,000 patients were rescued from the battlefield.
Some made it. Others didn’t.
He’s been awarded with two Bronze Star Medals, two Meritorious Service Medals, and the Combat Action Badge. He’s led countless missions and exercises, as well as thousands of soldiers. He retired as a Colonel after decades of leadership, grit, and sacrifice.
If you ever ask him about his time in uniform, he won’t start with medals. I can almost guarantee he’ll share an animated story of one of his rescue missions. And somewhere in there, I promise he’ll quote Isaiah 6:8: “Here am I. Send me.”
That verse—unassuming, unglamorous—is the quiet backbone of who he is. It’s not just a scripture. It’s how he served. How he lives. It was woven into the fabric of our family’s way of life. And in many ways, how he fathered. With humility. With resolve. With a deep belief in stepping up when it counts.
If you’ve never heard the story of Isaiah 6, the prophet Isaiah has this intense vision where he sees God on a throne with angels all around, and it’s super overwhelming. He immediately feels unworthy, like, “I shouldn’t be here, I’m too messed up.”
An angel touches his lips with a hot coal—kind of symbolic—and says he’s been forgiven. Then God asks, “Who should I send?” and Isaiah just goes, “Here I am, send me.”
It’s the moment he basically says yes to a calling that’s hard and won’t make him popular—God tells him upfront that most people won’t listen or change. But Isaiah steps up anyway.
It’s a story of divine calling and the cost of speaking truth even when it falls on deaf ears. Personal surrender. And one of the best things I’ve learned from my dad is to be brave enough to step up and do your best.
When Dads Become People
Now, let me be clear. I am not about to compare myself to a decorated military veteran. I’m far too painfully self aware to do that.
But when you’re raised by someone who believes in self-discipline, in the art of showing up for yourself and for others, it shapes the lens through which you see the world–and yourself.
While his résumé reads like something out of a movie, to know my dad is to know humility. Humor. The art of listening well. The kind of man who can make you laugh and teach you something in the same breath.
He’s one of the best storytellers I’ve ever met. I know his stories so well I could mouth the words as he tells them. I know how he’ll react if I drop big news. I know which memory will light his eyes up and make him laugh. I know the rhythm of his remembering.
But lately, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve started to see him more clearly–not as a superhero, but as a man just as mighty.
There’s a strange shift that happens when you grow up and realize your parents are people. Like, actual people–with actual lives, pasts, fears and entire identities outside of their roles of being your parent.
As a child, my dad always felt like a fixture: reliable, predictable, solid. The man who woke up early, drank his coffee and said, “Good morning” to me each day. He was just…dad. The protector, the driver. The fixer of things.
But as an adult, I realize my dad is a person with dreams and failures and faults and quirks. He’s not perfect, he’s human. One day 27 years ago, alongside my mom, he was tasked with the responsibility of raising me from scratch and keeping me alive. To teach me how to be a ‘good person’ and what that actually looks like in practice.
Because of his military tours in the Middle East, several years of my childhood are marked by gaps where he should’ve been—Meet the Teacher nights, soccer games, summer camps, the school pickup line. And while I understand now that his call to duty was greater than my call from home, it’s hard to explain that kind of absence to a kid.
But time has a way of filling in the blanks. What felt like absence slowly turned into understanding—as I got older, I began to know him not just as “Dad,” but as a person.
A man who taught me how to jump my car battery and to trust myself. He taught me how to be proud, but remain humble. To work hard and play hard. To not let the world harden me–even when it tries so damn hard. To not give up.
A man who taught me the importance of always treating others well.
My dad is someone who always gave what he had and who maybe didn’t always know how to say the right thing–or say it softly, because who does–but whose love was never in question.
Fathers and Father Figures
I know I’m lucky. Not just because my dad is a decorated war hero or a world-class storyteller, but because I get to say I have a father whose love has never been in doubt. He showed it in the way he led by example, in the discipline he lived by, and in the quiet constancy of showing up. The kind of love that leaves a mark.
But I also know that for many, Father’s Day doesn’t feel this way. For those who have lost their dad, never met them, or carry wounds from relationships with their fathers, this day can ache in ways that are hard to name. For those of you whose mother had to play both parts. For those whose father figure is an uncle, a mentor, your best friend’s dad, who stepped up. There’s no right way to feel today. I hope you know you deserve all the tenderness, love, and protection.
He may not have sat me down with a manual for life, but I watched him. I learned. I listened—even if he didn’t think I was. And in all the small, steady ways he moved through the world, he showed me exactly how to live with integrity, loyalty, and love. Not as a hero, but as a dad.
Maybe that’s the greatest thing he ever taught me: That you don’t have to wear a uniform to live with courage. That the bravest thing a person can do is show up—consistently, quietly, wholeheartedly.
And maybe, without realizing it, I’ve spent my life watching how he answered his calling—not just on the battlefield, but in the mundane, sacred work of being a dad.
For me, that’s the real legacy he leaves. Not just the stories or medals, but the example. The way he lived when no one was watching. The way he answered life’s hard moments without flinching.
If I’ve inherited anything worth holding onto, I hope it’s that. So if the world ever asks who will try—who will love, who will lead, who will stay—I hope I’m brave enough to say: Here I am. Send me.
