I’m thinking of my dad today on Father’s Day. He was a good man! I’m also thinking of how proud I am of my three sons who are really good fathers.

I think what really makes a good dad is how much quality time you spend with your kids. That you make them a priority and that trait can be passed down from generation to generation. Looking back now as an adult, I realize that when I was a young child my dad was very busy starting a business! Yet I always remember him being present and spending lots of time with me and my siblings.

He would come home in the summer after a long day at work and still play catch with me and my brother in the back yard. We would wait with our gloves and his glove in the driveway for him to come home. The minute he got out of the car we would throw him his glove and we would play catch or have a neighborhood game of baseball with the neighbor kids. Dad always pitched. That was always a good memory for me. Dad also loved to take us fishing at the Cottonwood River in New Ulm for bullheads! Our family loved bullheads! We would catch them by the bucket loads sometime. I can see him smiling and laughing while we kids were catching them one after the other and he didn’t even have time for a cigarette..

I also played ball with my boys in the backyard and I really enjoyed it. Sometimes the whole neighborhood would be in our small backyard playing catch with a baseball or football. I could have done a better job spending more time with my kids looking back now. I loved our many wrestling matches in our living room. We were actually imitating pro wrestlers like Dr. X, Crusher, Hulk Hogan and Ric Flair. The boys would jump off the back of the couch on me hard! Elbow or leg drop! Brianna would get involved sometimes and she could hold her own. She was an amazing wrestler in the living room. She could dish it out! Sometimes it got out of hand and Roxie would have to put a stop to it before someone got hurt or ended up crying, which happened often.

When I observe my sons being dads it really makes me smile. All three spend way more time with their kids than I ever spent with them. I think being a dad today is way more difficult then ever before. There are so many things to distract dads now. So that is why I am so proud of my boys. They are good people and fantastic fathers.