Daddy's Little Girl

You can call me Daddy's Little Girl. I was just that, afterall.

Wednesday morning, I met with one of my dad's best friends for coffee. I wasn't really active in my dad's life when he became friends with this man. He's a local attorney, and, from what I can tell, has always been a nice person. After a few Facebook posts, we decided to meet up to talk about my dad. It has been about 13 years since my dad passed away of a heart attack.

My father was really involved with the local community. He would help out in our Catholic church and we were all part of the choir for Sunday Spanish Mass. Our town was fairly small at that time (pop. 5,000). If it were up to me, I would have NO part in it, but everyone I went to school with went to church there, and helped out someway or another.

My father didn't always live this way. The first half of his life, he was an alcoholic and ladies man. He wanted a boy, and got me instead. I was his little sidekick.

His story is so incredible, a Mexican illegal immigrant eventually getting his citizenship, starting an AA Chapter, taking us along to meetings and anniversaries up and down the State (CA), bringing politicians and to our small town for housing development for the poor. Honestly some impressive stuff. I'll share tidbits later.

Back to coffee... I was holding back the tears for most of the hour. We spoke about how they first met through our Catholic church. The priest at the time was always trying to help the poor in our community. Our family was among the poor, but my dad and our family would still give back to our community (which annoyed the CRAP out of me. I was a selfish kid; sue me.) Our priest and the lawyer set one day a month to offer free consultations to our parishoners. My father would help immigrants and their families with the paperwork to become citizens. There was a part of the process where an attorney would be needed in some cases, and that's where my father was unable to help these families.

My father's friend told me that my dad approached him and asked him to take on these cases. Since the attorney was not an immigration attorney, he was not able to take on the cases himself. Still wanting to help, the attorney began to make some calls and was eventually connected with a female immigration attorney in California. She ended up being a relative of Cesar Chavez, someone who lived to right the social injustices and worker's rights for Hispanic farm laborers.

My father and the attorney, Ron, became very close friends after this. They both worked closely with our priest, Father Garcia. Ron and I were able to share a few funny stories and a little about how my father's sudden death affected us. We agreed to meet more often to share more stories. It's a way for us to keep my dad's memory alive and to find out what kind of man he was in someone else's eyes.

Ron left me with one profound statement. He said, "If there is only one thing to be said about your father, it is that 13 years later this gringo attorney still thinks of him and misses him often."

Yeah, tear jerker. And the flood gates opened...