If you read my story entitled Mr L. you will maybe be able to understand the gift my kids got me for Father’s Day this year. The Full story is here:

https://weirdbeardblog.com/2018/04/16/mr-l/

But, for this story you can just read this small little excerpt:

Since we were also green and yellow he bought these little shamrock stickers, and if you did something good, or something to help the team, he would give you one to put on your hat.

No idea if I need to put quotes around something I wrote, I’m new to this writing thing so I decided to just Italicize it.  The grammar police should accept ignorance as an excuse and not be too angry with me.

The story is about a lot of things, but basically it details how my favorite coach affected my life.  How lots of little things he did added up to shaping lots of us into the men we are today.  One piece of that story related to these shamrock stickers he would give us when something we did was good, or benefitted our team.  Great little motivational tool to help us win; help us go the extra mile for the teammate next to you.

Father’s Day in my house is always crazy.  Kids and wife are up at the crack of dawn to get ready and drive to their recital.  This year, both daughters needed to be out the door with the wife early and I got to hang home for an hour or so before I needed to head to the shows.  Before they all left for the morning I was woken up with the standard Happy Father’s Day hugs that all the Dads get.  Then they both handed me a small little shamrock sticker and said they got them cause of all the good you do for us.  We hug for a minute and I teared up a little, cause that’s what I do… and then they left.

So, I was left home alone with a few tears and just was able to think about how incredibly awesome a $3 gift was.  It wasn’t a gift at all really, it was a thought.

My wife later told me that my brother read my blog and found the stickers online and decided to give my kids the stickers so they could give them to me.   My brother, for NO reason, other than being an awesome person thought of me because I wrote a dumb blog that reminded him of that same coach, of those same experiences.   So, he gave me the gift of thought.

This past weekend I got a text from my brother asking me to help him paint the room in his house where his new little baby girl will be sleeping.  I got this text on a Thursday, asking me to help him Friday night. I didn’t have any crazy plans, but the week had lots in it and I was planning to just veg on coach and do nothing.  So I mentioned to my wife about how I HAVE to help my brother and seeing if she knew of an excuse I could use and she looked at me like I was insane and said “has he ever said no to you, EVER?”.   She was right, as she typically is, so I went over and helped him out.

She reminded me of all the good that is in my life.   She helped my brother get the help he needed to paint, just as a week before my brother helped my kids get an extremely thoughtful gift to give to their Dad.

Life isn’t about the gift, life is about the thought.  Thoughts mean WAY more and cost WAY less.  I’m lucky that I have people in my life that remind me what love is.  Some people aren’t Shakespeare with their words, some, like my brother, use their actions to show love.  It is nice to have those people in your life who express their feelings to you with words as those are important, but it is so awesome to see love in someone’s actions.

Find your tribe, and express your love for them however you know how.  People see it and feel it. Do what you can to create some happy tears.  They help make this world a better place, one thought at a time.