I was never a “typical” girl. Of course now we know, none of us were. Girls are all complex individuals with differing personalities and interests, but before we were allowed to explore those we were trained to fit into a “typical” girl mold. I did not. I was what you call a Tom-boy. Meaning, I liked things other than cooking, sewing, and shopping. Give me an oversized flannel shirt and some blue jeans and I was good to go.

I was never much interested in being in the kitchen, but as a southern young lady I learned from the best. The women in my family were some incredible cooks and they wove a tapestry of flavors handed down from their mothers. I, on the other hand, never followed a recipe. If I was in the kitchen I was experimenting, which, if you didn’t know, messes with tradition. Don’t even get me started on my attempt to sew. My poor grandmother tried several times to teach me to no avail. I guess that is why I was told to go play. And play I did.

Riding bikes all over creation. Climbing any tree where I could reach the first branch. Barefoot as often as possible. Hair never brushed. The opposite of prim and proper. Maybe there was a bit of a wild streak in me somewhere. I felt I never really fit the societal expectations of what a girl was supposed to be.

Enter Dad. When I was kicked from the kitchen and the sewing room, Dad scooped me up. He made me his little buddy. We went fishing. We took walks. He was the one who taught me how to roll my jeans up so I could creek walk. He showed me the difference between a crawdad and a salamander, and how to find them. We hiked the woods often. He showed me out to step over logs with awareness of the snakes that might be underneath. Back then, I even liked snakes a little bit. (No worries, I grew out of my snake phase!)

On our little hikes, he pointed out the wildflowers. I still have my little book where I wrote the name of the flower and where I saw it. However, my descriptions were lacking specifics…”next to the road” for example…I am sure I never found that flower again! He took me to sliding rock where I swam in my clothes. We went canoeing and rafting in the rivers. He taught me the different trees by their leaves. He secretly let me ride my horse bareback. We went berry picking, and he let me climb the apple trees and throw him the apples that would be turned into his favorite apple jelly. I went with him to put the 4^th of July watermelon into the spring house to keep it cold.

He always took interest in what I was interested in. Wood carving looked cool, but I was too young to use the knives without adult supervision…and a girl… so he signed up for a class with me so I could explore. When the he couldn’t get the ears exactly right, his perfectionism turned the donkey he carved into a horse. Those ears got smaller and smaller and he stopped only because he thought an earless donkeyhorse wouldn’t be very realistic. Every time I see that horse and the hillbilly I carved, I laugh.

When Bill had his accident, Dad flew back from a business meeting and came straight to the hospital. He opened his arms and I melted into them with sobs. He has been my quiet protector my entire life. I guess what I am getting at is that Dad was my champion. He allowed me to be myself in a time when everyone else expected something different. I say I am a hybrid, because I did learn how to set a table, how to be a gracious hostess, and how to cook. Those things are very much a part of who I am, but they are not all of me. The mountain part of me was a seed that Dad watered, nurtured and allowed to grow.  I will forever be grateful to him for that. Now the question is, how do I go on without him to lean on?