If you have only one smile in you, give it to the people you love. Don't be surly at home, then go out in the street and start grinning "Good morning" at total strangers.
--Maya Angelou

Someone should have given this advice to my father. My brother, and I, used to marvel at what an angry, depressed, mean, old man my old man was in the house, and then how he would light up to be the happy Irish man, the minute he got out the door, and got around other people. My dad had a lot of issues, and he took them out on us. Oh well, he had a lot of good points, too. I’m sure that he did the best that he could with what he was given. My job is to not point a finger at him, anymore, but to not to be that way myself, and to not pass on the behaviors to my kids. Rip my father. I thank you for the good things that you gave me, the good things that you taught me. I apologize for the shitty things that I did to you. I was not the perfect child that you sought. I’ll be where you are, one day, part of everything, again, and while I am still here, I want to have a smile on my face, in the house, and out.