Big shoes to fill...

I was born two days after Father's Day in 1972...  June 18, 1972 was actually the FIRST official Father's Day thanks to Richard Nixon.  I was born the following Tuesday...making my dad a father for the first time.  I find it very appropriate that my birthday and Father's Day sort of go hand in hand... I am a self-professed "daddy's girl", and sharing my birthday with dad's special day has always seemed fitting.

I am so very thankful for the man who is my father... Over the years I have come to appreciate my dad more and more...  I worshiped him when I was just a little girl...he was a playmate and jungle gym, took me with him to spend hours in my grandfather's greenhouse, and provided our family with great summer vacations.  While he and I have always been close, there were plenty of years between being a teenager and a college graduate that my dad and I had challenges seeing each others point of view...that was just a part of growing up (probably for both of us).  At this stage in my life, as a parent myself, I value all of the characteristics that make him both a great father, as well as a good man, more than I ever did.

I have read research that discusses how women that do not have a strong father figure in their life have trouble being successful in romantic relationships because they are looking for a man who can also fill the role of the father that they don't have.  But, I wonder... Do the women with proportionately stronger relationships with their fathers also have a more difficult time?  Can any man fill the shoes of the father that is everything to his daughter?

In my own relationships, I don't think that I have ever made comparisons between my dad and the men in my life...but maybe I should have?  I think it is not so much about my dad specifically as it is about his character.  No man will ever replace my dad or be what he is to me... I would, however, be lucky to find a man with some of his best traits...loyalty, dependability, sense of humor, commitment to family.  Perhaps the real mission should be to find someone who possesses those important traits.