My Daddy

He's really my great-uncle if you want to be technical about it, and there is no blood shared between us but I never would have known it by the way he treated me. They had their own children (4 boys) and Daddy always wanted a girl so when my Mother came home with me the first time I'm told it was love at first sight. They wanted me and she couldn't let me go but some how they reached an agreement, so I stayed. The first time it was 6 months and when I left they tell me it was like somebody had died. So I spent my life going back and forth between them. I suppose if I thought about it I could come up with a lot of bad things about it but what I remember the most was being totally and completely loved. Having two places to call home and two sets of people to call my family.

There was never a difference made between the boys and I, I was their sister and never felt any different. Daddy loved me, that I always knew and there was many a fight when it would be time for my Mom to take me back with her. Daddy is at heart the best man I've ever known, he has worked hard since he was a child and doesn't know how to quit. But what I love the most about him is that he let me be the child I was and loved me no matter what I did or what I said (and as a teenager I said quite a bit). He has always been an example to me of the way a man should provide for his family and the love a child should always feel no matter what the circumstance. He has always been the man first in my heart (sorry honey), and without him I hate to think what life would have been.

I love you Daddy, for loving a little girl you had no reason to and for raising the woman I have become.