He is never far from my thoughts

My father’s been gone for 15 years, and while I can’t say I think about him every day, he’s never far from my thoughts.

Among the many things he taught me was how to hunt and fish, two pastimes that consume me for much of the year. He’d be fine with that, but he’d also remind me to call my sister, and go to church.

My earliest memories afield go back to a squirrel hunting trip with him when I was still too young to carry a gun. He’d gotten permission to hunt a stand of hardwoods that bordered a peach orchard near our home in southern Indiana.

At dawn we sat on the ground with our backs to a tr...