I have been reflecting on our dad. Ronald Wheeler was a good man, a caring man, a hard worker who took pride in doing a good job in whatever he did. He could talk. Oh goodness could he talk. I recently saw a report card of his dated 1939. He would have been 6 years old. He had satisfactory ratings in all categories but one. In the area of Dependableness he got a ‘Needs Improvement’ rating with a teacher note of “Talks”. That says a lot. He was born with the gift of talking. It was not a learned skill. He was curious. He always wondered how things worked. He believed that he could fix anything and, in my lifetime, more times than not he was right. He was willing to help just about everybody but there was a price. He always had a story. Some were okay, and many he told numerous times, some may have even stretched to truth from time to time. He believed that anything could be made to work better. Sometimes he didn’t know when to stop trying to make things work better, but he believed that his efforts were tied to his reputation. Reputation and dependability were always very important to him. Reputation was a measure of who he was.
He could run and jump and go without sleep for hours at a time. I remember many days playing catch. Somedays baseball and other days football. All of which made his last days very sad as he struggled to get around.
As I reflect, many of the elements that have made me who I am, I got from my dad. He wasn’t perfect but of course who is? He seldom forced us but rather he led by example. He will be remembered by many for being a man of honor, pride, and loving family. By others he will be remembered as a man of endless skills who could fix anything. I am very lucky that he was such an influence in the development of who I have become.