A few thoughts about my Dad

Armin F. Weber, Jr. (1923-2003)

The single greatest influence on me and my life has been my father, Armin F. Weber, Jr. Not only is today Father’s Day, but Dad died 20 years ago today, on June 18, 2003, when he was 79.

Dad taught me many things. I ended up a professional writer because of him as well as two great writing mentors. He loved etymology — tracking back the origins of words — and he was fluent or highly familiar with German, Spanish, French, Latin, Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic.

Much of Dad’s influence on me transpired during our hundreds of in-depth conversations — and many of our talks took place as we walked our family’s collies, fed or rode our Appaloosas and other horses, or camped and hiked in the woods of northern New Mexico and upstate Wisconsin, where Dad grew up and lived until his mid-thirties.

It was during these talks that my lifelong curiosity about spiritual and psychological matters was fired up. Dad was a Protestant pastor who spent hours each week counseling people, and he had both a scholarly approach and a real-life approach to psychospiritual growth.

Dad was a daily exemplar of a fullness of life in the Christian faith. He was a truly good man. He was empathetic and loving. He was wise, intelligent, and sensible. And he was psychologically healthy and fully engaged with life.

Dad had a rare quality about him when people were injured or ill or when their loved one was in the hospital or had died. In the midst of suffering, in the midst of tragedy, Dad conveyed something profound. Beyond any of the words he uttered, he had an intangible empathetic bond with people that was powerfully healing and uplifting.

I often wondered why, and after he died, I settled on this explanation: For some reason, right after high school, during World War II — while the death rate for Americans in uniform was about two percent — Dad lost in combat all four of his closest high school friends. Surely this experience provided the roots or origin of his depth surrounding tragedy, suffering, death, and grief.

In these and other ways, Dad was wise love in action. I was deeply affected by Dad’s positive outlook, happiness, joy, empathy, love, warmth, kindness, wisdom. intelligence, and ethos of work and achievement.

I should share with you that I was adopted. In Milwaukee in Fall 1966, Armin Weber was 42 years old and he and his wife Marjorie already had six children of their own. The couple came into a home managed by two nurses, picked me out from among several toddlers, and brought me home that Christmas season as their seventh child.

I’ve known both my adoptive family and my natural mother’s family since I was 24, and took on “Goodenow” as my middle name to honor my natural lineage. But I’ve only known one father.

This morning, I remember especially the ways he taught me how to act from wise love each day, each hour, the best I can. And I remember especially how he taught me to engage with life with a positive outlook and existential joy, even amidst tragedy and suffering.

When your father is so self-actualizing and so nearly perfect, it’s a lot to try to live up to. Most days the standard he set is beyond my reach, but on my best days I like to think I get close.