Thirty-four years later James Hirtle would drive his car, filled with his family, across the Oakland-Bay Bridge, but only after a Bay area policeman stopped all the traffic on the bridge to allow this family of eight to turn around and head towards their desired destination...The Golden Gate Bridge.
Four months before James came into the world, fifteen hundred miles away in Fort Worth, Texas, Katie Mae Walker was born. You see, God had looked into the timeline of James and knew that one day he would need an incredible woman to be his wife. So God's perfect plan brought Katie into the world at the perfect moment.
For God saw that one day, some twenty-five years later a baby girl called Sandy would arrive in His world and she would need the perfect parents.
God also knew that this baby girl would need a baby sister, so He blessed James and Katie and gave them another baby called Cindy.
Oh but His plans were far from complete. Over the next six years He would add to this family two more baby girls, Janet and Sue. And as a bonus gift He would give to James and Katie two sons. The youngest called Mike, the oldest was yours truly-named after my father.
And the journey began.
Over the next forty-three years James and Katie would travel North America with their six children in tow. But it was far from perfect. It was an imperfect journey, for an imperfect family living in an imperfect world. A million tears would be shed, a million laughs would be shared. Doubts and worries would consume not only the parents of this flawed family but each child would carry their own burden.
And yet God's plan was perfect. I know this because this is my family. This, all of this was God's plan. Years have passed and God has called home my father and my baby sister. But His plan is still perfect.
My father would never have won a Father-of-the-year award. He wasn't the kind to toss a ball or wet a fishing line with children. I struggle to find good memories of my father from childhood, those didn't come until I became a father and realized what a tough road that is to travel.
What my father left me was the memory that he never, never left us.
God's perfect plan began with a baby girl born in Fort Worth, Texas. God knew that the boy from Nova Scotia would need someone like her in his life...every day. God knew that six little children all born in the great state of Texas would need a Yankee like my father to build one perfect memory-he never left us.
A trip to Alaska, a car filled with kids, and a wrong turn onto the wrong bridge is the epitome of the imperfect Hirtle Clan living out God's perfect plan.
Happy Birthday Dad, I love you.
