Teaching Moments

I remember that Dad always took any chance he had to teach us.  He would try to teach us during moments we would be teachable, and would often refer to experiences from his own life to teach us.  When a teaching moment would arise, he would pull us aside individually.  He always spoke in such a quiet and calm voice that I would just sit there and listen to him quietly.  One time my siblings and I must have not been getting along when he pulled me aside.  He told me about his best friend growing up who was named Pat.  They were really good friends and did a lot of things together.  However, sometimes they would argue.  Dad had only one arm, but it was really strong because he used it for everything.  Because of this if they were actually to fight, Dad would have really hurt Pat.  One time when they were arguing, Dad realized that things were escalating and knew that he had to be the one to stop it.  He stopped the fight and made Pat leave.  He was glad that things had stopped before anything regrettable had happened.  He used this to teach me that sometimes even best friends get in fights, but they are still friends afterwards.  He taught me that even in the heat of the moment, sometimes you have to be the bigger person and take control of a situation to make sure that nothing regrettable happens.  I heard him tell this story a couple of times so I must have been a slow learner.  He had a couple of other stories he would tell about his friend, Pat.