family

Daddy’s girl

Written by Sarah Blake LaRose on . Leave a comment

Today is officially Father’s Day in the United States. A lot of people will write posts on Facebook and share pictures of their fathers. It is, after all, the day to talk about dads–the dad one has or the dad one misses.

I could say, many years down the road, that my dad was a great man and everyone needs a father just like him. And all those things might be true. But I should say it today, on a day when he deserves his appreciation and he can read this post. I have some friends who feel quite strong things about days reserved for this kind of expression. “Why not say how you feel every day?” they have said. And they are right.

But once in a while, it is good to recount all the things that have brought you to where you are. And so today, I would like to speak about my dad.

My earliest memories of my dad are of him taking time to play with me on the floor. I doubt he enjoyed this very much, but he did it. He crawled around on the floor so that I could chase him and pretend he was a cat. (He even meowed for me.) He made big boxes into houses for me to crawl in and out of, and I made him crawl in and out of them too.I don’t remember him ever telling me he was too old or too big.

For a little while, we lived a few blocks from a park; and he walked with me to the park so that I could play. He had to teach me how to play on some of the toys that didn’t come naturally to me. I never mastered monkey bars. In fact, I thought I might just have to hang there forever because letting go in order to get down just might be too scary. But we did try, and he got me down.

I didn’t ride a bike alone in the neighborhood. In fact, I didn’t wander the neighborhood on my own at all. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, blind children didn’t receive the kind of education in travel that they do today, and parents were not encouraged to let children travel independently at young ages. So while I had training in cane travel at school and in the school neighborhood, my parents remained completely unaware of what I could do for quite some time.

To get me out and about, Dad rode tandem bike with me for many years. This activity benefitted me in more ways than I can describe well in one post. I learned the layout of the neighborhood and developed good physical strength and stamina. When I thought I could just sit back and enjoy the ride, he let me know in no uncertain terms that I was one heavy load! I complained about his grunting, and he exclaimed, “Pedal!!!”

My dad read to me. Not just once in a while. He read to me on a regular basis from the time when I was a little girl until I was a teenager. Our “magnum opus” reading project was the entire Lord of the Rings series. But he did much more than read it to me. He had to start many chapters over because I fell asleep. Incidentally, Dad also read the tragic chapters in the books that Mom read aloud. I asked after high school graduation if he would please read me the Tolkien series once more. He wasn’t so enthused then, but he did it.

My dad had numerous versions of the Bible on his shelves. In fact, I recall that he even had different printings of the same version. I was always curious about this. I had only a partial copy of the Bible in braille, and I assumed that an NIV was an NIV. When I went away to college at Anderson University, I needed to take some Bible classes. I decided to write a paper about Jacob wrestling with the angel. That presented a problem since I didn’t have passages to compare.

I called Dad and asked if he would read the passages on tape and mail the tape to me. He did, and I had a great time writing the paper. That tape is still one of my treasures today.

I eventually acquired a large machine that enabled me to scan books and hear them read allowed in synthesized speech. I lugged the machine to the library at the state university where I was ginishing my undergraduate degree so that I could do my own research for papers. I also had a strong interest in learning about my eye condition. So after I finished my university studies, my dad drove me and my machine to medical libraries so that I could read books and medical journals. In addition to serving as driver, he also walked all over those libraries and pulled items from the shelves for me to read.

My dad has been my driver on numerous trips back and forth from Indiana to Michigan during the past 18 years as I have had surgeries and follow-up appointments. (We now listen to The Lord of the Rings on road trips.) I tell a lot of people that it is a miracle that I have sight in my right eye at this stage of my life, that I am thankful to God every day and that my doctor in Michigan is wonderful. But I owe as much thanks to my dad as I do to God and to my doctor. None of this would have happened without my dad.

Finally, my dad just does a lot of nice things that make my life happy. Sometimes he and Mom ask, “What would you do without us?” I say, “I would manage.” That is true. My dad does lots of sweet dad favors for me, like fixing things around my house and cleaning gross things that I find abominable. (My husband also cleans up things that I find abominable.) I could always hire a handyman if needed. But there is nothing like being able to trust my dad and knowing that when he’s finished he will tell me exactly what he did and make sure that I understand–and that he knows just how to be sure that I understand, because he has lived with me and knows what happens when I don’t understand.

That is a good dad! I love my dad, and I am not ashamed of being a daddy’s girl.

My dad and I like…

About Sarah Blake LaRose

Sarah Blake LaRose teaches Biblical Hebrew and Greek at Anderson University School of Theology and Christian Ministry in Anderson, Indiana. She is one of three blind academic scholars who received the Jacob Bolotin Award from the National Federation of the Blind in 2016 in recognition of innovative work in the field of access to biblical language texts and tools for people who are blind. In addition to her work as a professor, she provides braille transcription services specializing in ancient languages. Her research interests concern the intersection of disability, poverty, and biblical studies.
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About Sarah Blake LaRose

Sarah Blake LaRose teaches Biblical Hebrew and Greek at Anderson University School of Theology and Christian Ministry in Anderson, Indiana. She is one of three blind academic scholars who received the Jacob Bolotin Award from the National Federation of the Blind in 2016 in recognition of innovative work in the field of access to biblical language texts and tools for people who are blind. In addition to her work as a professor, she provides braille transcription services specializing in ancient languages. Her research interests concern the intersection of disability, poverty, and biblical studies.

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