This post doesn't relate to birds directly, but to the person responsible for getting me interested in birds in my youth. My Dad, Bill, had been a bird watcher as a child as part of his becoming an Eagle Scout. During his mid-forties, he rediscovered his love of birds, with me prodding him to get out and enjoy them like he had done when he was a kid. It made sense too since it was a less labor intensive hobby than crashing and repairing model gliders. Ironically, it was my hiking with him when he was birding that turned me on to the hobby myself (though hobby doesn't nearly convey its importance to me now). Our shared passion for birding also unlocked lines of communication and brought us closer together than we had ever been. This closeness was to last a lifetime.
My Dad's love of nature and the outdoors was manifest long before he returned to birding. Memories of my childhood are filled with thoughts of great hikes, camping trips to Big Basin in the Santa Cruz mountains, and longer forays to the Sierra Nevadas of California. Then there was all of the fishing we did together. Dad freeing lures snagged under rocks and boulders, and time spent unsnarling all of the fishing line my brother and I had managed to entangle around our fishing reels. We even managed to catch a few fish. We also did a lot of beach combing, tide pooling, and hunting for fossils in the Santa Cruz mountains, often traveling around in his old beat up Karmann Ghia. That car got us just about everywhere we wanted to go.
Once I left home for college and later my work with Field Guides, I didn't see my Dad nearly so often. We did a few birding trips together, including my first visit to southeast Arizona. We even managed to get a Honda Prelude down into California Gulch so we could see Five-striped Sparrow. He also came and visited me while I was living in Austin, Texas and the two of us made a birding foray to the Rio Grande Valley in July. Wow, was that hot!
Around the time that my first child was born, my parents moved to Arizona to be close to the grand kids. My Dad was a great help with the kids, looking after them so that my ex-wife and I could get a little adult time. My Dad and I still had a few travel plans in the works, but he became sick in 2003, which put some of these plans on hold. We traveled together to Belize in 2005, and it was great to introduce my Dad to tropical birding. We had a great time together, but it would turn out to be our last birding trip together.
Wednesday morning marked the passing of my father, seventy-six years young. He had been battling multiple myeloma and esophageal cancer for over four years. The attached picture is from happier times with my Dad, on his brother's ranch in northern California back in the summer of 1979.
Chris
My Dad's love of nature and the outdoors was manifest long before he returned to birding. Memories of my childhood are filled with thoughts of great hikes, camping trips to Big Basin in the Santa Cruz mountains, and longer forays to the Sierra Nevadas of California. Then there was all of the fishing we did together. Dad freeing lures snagged under rocks and boulders, and time spent unsnarling all of the fishing line my brother and I had managed to entangle around our fishing reels. We even managed to catch a few fish. We also did a lot of beach combing, tide pooling, and hunting for fossils in the Santa Cruz mountains, often traveling around in his old beat up Karmann Ghia. That car got us just about everywhere we wanted to go.
Once I left home for college and later my work with Field Guides, I didn't see my Dad nearly so often. We did a few birding trips together, including my first visit to southeast Arizona. We even managed to get a Honda Prelude down into California Gulch so we could see Five-striped Sparrow. He also came and visited me while I was living in Austin, Texas and the two of us made a birding foray to the Rio Grande Valley in July. Wow, was that hot!
Around the time that my first child was born, my parents moved to Arizona to be close to the grand kids. My Dad was a great help with the kids, looking after them so that my ex-wife and I could get a little adult time. My Dad and I still had a few travel plans in the works, but he became sick in 2003, which put some of these plans on hold. We traveled together to Belize in 2005, and it was great to introduce my Dad to tropical birding. We had a great time together, but it would turn out to be our last birding trip together.
Wednesday morning marked the passing of my father, seventy-six years young. He had been battling multiple myeloma and esophageal cancer for over four years. The attached picture is from happier times with my Dad, on his brother's ranch in northern California back in the summer of 1979.
Chris
