His Voice

I don’t usually repost old posts, but sometimes when you get it right, and time is right, it’s only right to run it back. So see below my father’s day reflection from a year ago, still as true today as the day I wrote it:

I played a lot of sports growing up. Soccer, basketball, lacrosse, track. If you were on my team, or came to any of my games, then you knew my father. Or I should say, you knew his voice. Because every time I got the ball, or made a play, everyone on the field, or in the gym, would hear that voice, yelling:

And he didn’t just yell it. He’d kinda say-it/sing-it, you know? With that classic, Baptist-preacher delivery.

There simply was no other voice like it.

My coaches would smirk. My teammates would chuckle. At practice they’d try and mimic his soulful exclamations, and I’d laugh at their feeble attempts.

Someone would invariably ask if it ever got to me, if I was ever embarrassed by my father’s distinctive vocalizations, and I’d just smile and shake my head.

They couldn’t have known.

They weren’t there on Sunday, when that voice would utter the word of God – would call down angels and send up praises like Jacob’s ladder. They weren’t in attendance when it would command entire congregations, have them hanging on every syllable and intonation. Would have folks stand to their feet, hand raised, yelling their own exclamations:

My father’s voice could go from a deep rumble, to a soaring, straight-from-the-gut wail, to a full-on Gospel croon, all in one sentence. Make folks run up and down the aisle some days. Grown folk, in their best Sunday attire.

So to hear that voice, that baritone-to-tenor, mouthpiece of the most high, bellowing my name from the sideline? Shiiiit, I was ready to run through a brick wall.

Book it the entire length of that field, like those folks down them aisles.

Every “Oh yeah!” and “Go Dan!” was like a power-up, propelling me toward greater and greater acts of athleticism and will.

I was fast. But when my dad was edging me on from the sideline, I was a blur.

Embarrassed? Nah. That voice, was my secret weapon.

Now-a-days I don't really play sports anymore (something I’d like to change). But that voice still comes to my aid every now and then. It doesn’t have to yell these days, now we just talk. But after each conversation I still feel that battery in my back, and know it’s been fully charged.

It’s hard to put into words how important it’s been, having your voice, hearing those words of encouragement, knowing they were from you – standing on the sidelines, and in the audience (when I’ve commanded my own), and in my corner, through all these years. We haven't always seen eye to eye, and there’ve been times our relationship’s frayed. But I’ve always known where you stood, and more importantly, who you stood for.

And no matter what field I’ve found myself on, or in, I know it’s your voice that I hear rooting for me from the sidelines.

There’s simply no other voice like it.

Happy father’s day Pops, and to all the other fathers and father-figures speaking life into their kids.