the truth

the storm

meet pete part three

My father became a wonderful writer from one long and many other short steps. I have always been a writer and much of what I have created I have kept to myself. In the process of moving through my dad’s body of work, I have come to the realization that sharing my creations is necessary.

He retired from the bank and began to write business consultancy texts, leadership strategies, and small-scale operations manuals- all of which held importance to him but never flew to the heights of success that could have sustained this new venture. Nor did they rightfully capture the depth of his life lived for a corporation.

He lived for the bank, I think he loved the bank- when they parted ways, my dad got the memories, the bank took everything else. I will say that writing, in the least, allowed him a slow curtain call from a remarkable career that spanned four decades.

Funny thing is, I truly believe that his best writing, his own creative writing, sprung from the fall of his small business attempt. I have slowly worked my way through his pieces. I have found bits of treasure woven into his words, words that take me to places in his creativity that I never knew existed. Words that surprise me with bits of past forgotten. Images of things I thought he never noticed. But he did. It was me not noticing how he did it.

My mother and I were honoured to attend an event for the Writers Community of Durham Region where one of his pieces had been published. I read the piece, met his colleagues, spoke of his achievements, and felt him present. In that space, dots suddenly became connectors and connectors became connections with life. I now see how my dad existed in spaces, hidden from me, yet he beckoned to me, spoke to me, reached out to me – I missed the cues.

Writing his eulogy broke me down and built me back up over and over. Reading it to an audience gave strange peace and took my breath away several times. The next few ‘meet pete’ posts are taken from the eulogy for my dad.

The posts will eventually shift to his writing pieces. Many are stories, wrapped in lessons, shaped with humour. My dad was like that. So am I.