I received the news that my dad died. My uncle told me on Saturday that he wasn’t in good shape, and I had planned to go visit him. I missed him by a few hours. It’s hit me a lot harder than I ever expected.

My dad never took care of himself the way he should have, so I feel like I’ve been preparing for this for fifteen years. It didn’t make any difference though. All the thought I put into it and preparation I did meant very little when it actually happened. I’ve been in pretty bad shape for the last two days, and I didn’t expect it quite like that.

It was cancer that technically finished him, but in all honesty it was smoking and lack of being healthy that was the real reason. I’ve learned more from my father than most people I’ve met in my life, but in different ways than a lot of people. I learned so much of what not to do. Not just what not to do. Other things, too, like how to bowl and garden and fish, but so many shining examples of things to avoid. Smoking. Alcohol. Being stubborn. He directly made me who I am today by making some huge mistakes so I never had to. And I’ll be grateful for that for the rest of my life. I wanted to tell him that stuff, but I didn’t get the chance to. He knew I loved him, though, so I’m happy about that.

I hope through me he can be an example to others, too. Take care of yourselves. Toss out the bad habits now so that later the people you love can spend that much more time with you. If you don’t want to do it for yourself, do it for them. But you should want to do it for yourself. You’re an important person who is important to other people, even if you sometimes don’t think that way. He often thought less of himself because of the mistakes he made, but every day is a new chance to make new choices. Every minute, you can decide to change. It’s hard, but you can do it if you try even harder.

Growing up, I always thought my dad was really strong. He seemed to be able to lift anything and nothing was heavy to him. I felt like I’d never be as strong as he was. By the end, he was very weak, from being sick. And I don’t know how much it was my perception of strength it was when I was young, but it’s inspired me to be stronger. I want to be better in that regard. I’m going to start trying to build my own strength.

The reason I’m JKR and not a “real” name is because of him. He insisted I take the family name that he inherited from his father. I am Joseph the Third. Yet because there were already two, people decided to call me JKR instead. It was easier than keeping track of which Joseph you were talking about. So despite the name on my birth certificate, I’ve not been called that a day in my life. It truly has shaped who I am. Going by initials your entire life changes you, because it’s different. It altered everything about my childhood. One seemingly simple choice, a huge, HUGE change in the future. What my life would have been like if my mother had won and called me Michael, I’ll never know.

It always amazed me how many people my dad knew. I never really understood how, but it seemed like walking down the street everyone who passed him knew who he was and said hello. For all the stubbornness and negativity I sometimes dwelt on about him, he made connections with people very easily. He was always kind when it mattered most.

My dad always talked about God, even though sometimes I think he ran away from Him and didn’t listen to what He had to say. I believe he’s with God now, so I don’t cry for him, but for me who has to go many years without seeing him again. I think that when I do see him again, he’ll be strong again. He’ll be the best of all those times in his life that never seemed to sync up when I was around, but made him who he was. And in the meantime, I’ll take every lesson he gave me and try to use them to their fullest. I’ll take this experience and try to make myself better because of it. And I hope that would have made him happy.