Pocky Central

My father is one of my heroes.

He moved to the United States over thirty years ago, by himself, to start a new life. Not just for himself, but for his family back in South Korea, too.

He met my mother here in Maryland. That’s all I know. My father is a fairly private man. Thirty years, and I still don’t know much about him.

I know that he likes golf a lot. I know that he cares about his family more than anything else in the world, and that he would willingly destroy anything and everything that might threaten it. I know that he rather enjoys Korean television drama, and historical movies in general (like Tora Tora Tora).

I recently found out that he indeed was in the South Korean army. Up until last year, whenever I asked about it, he would deny it. It took one of my uncles mentioning that he was in the army for him to finally admit it.

Until a few years ago, my father really didn’t smile much. You can ask anyone who has known me for a while that has also met my father. He didn’t really start until I graduated college.

That day, he was smiling constantly. It was actually a little unnerving at first. Then my friend Jason took a picture of me, my mom, and my father together. For that one instant, he wasn’t smiling. We don’t know how he managed it. He just did.

My father has a quiet strength about him. He doesn’t brag, except in joking. He has a definite confidence to him that everyone who meets him can feel.

He is my hero, and I hope to be more like him some day.

–

As a humorous exercise, try replacing ‘Chuck Norris’ with ‘Richard’s dad’ and see how it sounds.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 10th, 2007 at 10:56 pm and is filed under Personal, Family. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.