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Dad

Oh, how she looks up at him. 

and how she grabs his finger with her tiny hand and won't let go. 

There's something so beautiful about a father holding onto his first baby girl for the very first time.

and something absolutely magical about the years left to come among them. 

There is so much growing; always, always growing. 

And a love that reaches deeper than she will ever see and she will always hope to someday understand. 

He tucks her in and reads her bedtime stories, 

he holds her through the heartbreaks.

The minute she is born, he seems to have opened up the door to all of the dad jokes. 

someday they will be overused and yet so funny that they still make her day. 

no matter who comes in or out of her life, 

she has him on her side, holding her up, pushing her forward, loving her in and from all directions. 

Oh, how she looks up at him.

and won't stop watching him with a smile, 

as he delivers his first public talk or when he offers to mow four different lawns all on the same afternoon. 

he teaches her about God. 

he builds up her taste in music.

he humbles her when she needs to be. 

he was standing there watching with tears as she came up to breathe her first breath of air as a new person. 

they both remember the nights when he would make her laugh before she would fall asleep. 

they both remember the tickles and the jokes and the "piggy-back" rides. 

they remember the days when she would ride her little tricycle around the kitchen to that same infamous song. 

Oh, how she looks up at him. 

Oh, how she loves him. 

Oh, how she's lost without him. 

Dad.