With Thanksgiving right around the corner, I have been thinking a lot about what I am thankful for. I have a great family, friends, job, the opportunity to attend college, the list goes on and on.

After I got off the phone with my Dad the other day it really hit me, I have a great Dad and am very thankful for him. He’s not just a great Dad in general, but a great man and one that I truly look up to. In fact, I hope my future husband is a lot like him.

My Mom and Dad have been married 26 years, that’s a long time. And even after 26 years, he is still infatuated with her and treats her like a princess every day. I feel like after being with someone for that long it would be very easy to become complacent and too comfortable, but not my Dad!

He still opens every door for her, calls her beautiful on a daily basis, and does anything he can to make her genuinely happy. Maybe he has really bought into the phrase, “Happy wife, happy life” but even so, he does a great job at it.

Another quality that I admire about him is that he can fix anything. Physically and mentally he can do it all. He has built houses that we’ve lived in, renovated every room in the house to my Mom’s liking, fixed my car on multiple occasions, and saved my softball swing whenever I was in a slump.

I also feel like he fine tunes my mind when it needs it most. He can calm me down and make me look at any situation with a positive mindset better than anyone I know. My Dad just gets me! He can play the husband, dad, plumber, electrician, contractor, mechanic, and occasionally even psychiatrist--he does it all.

If you haven’t figured it out by now, my Dad has done a lot in his life and that brings me to my next point. He is the hardest working person I know. He has done whatever was required, and then some, to make sure our family had everything they needed, no matter how many hours it took. When I was growing up he would work 50-60 hours a week at his job and still get in the car each night and drive me to a far away softball practice. Now, he works a similar schedule but comes home and renovates our house and plays handyman by night. This man is not afraid to get his hands dirty.

Finally, as simple as this is, it means the world to me-- when I call, he answers, no matter what. Whenever I have to fill out an information card and it asks to put down an emergency contact, I know who I can count on, Dad!

He would definitely answer his phone if something was wrong. The other day I called him while he was at work to talk about something non-important and he answered on one of the first rings, but I could hear background noise.

He asked me how I was doing and what I was up to, then I inquired about all the noise. He replied that he was currently under a dish machine trying to fix a restaurant’s dish problems and that if I was okay at the moment, he would give me a call back when he was done.

My Dad is on the floor under a huge commercial dish machine and still answers my phone call! I would never have expected him to answer under the circumstances, but he sure did. So I don’t want to hear any excuses from people as to why they missed my call, if my Dad can answer while laying under a dish machine, they can answer me too. Good job Mom, you picked a good one!

Well Dad, thank you. You have set the bar extremely high for any man that I encounter, but there probably will never be one that is as great as you. I love you and will always be your little girl.