(04/13/06) Updated final paragraph, because I thought it kinda sucked. Also, All further updates regarding any new developments about the murderer are now available at www.revwilliamhuang.com.
It was early on a Saturday morning, and I was putting on my tie to
attend my father's funeral. My thoughts drifted back to when my father
taught me how to tie a tie one Easter morning. I remembered that the
first couple times I wore a tie, my dad would point out that I hadn't
folded the collar down properly over the tie, or my knot was ugly. I
smiled, thinking of all little things I learned from my father. A wave
of sadness hit me as I realized that there was so much more I could
have learned from him, if only it weren't too late. A barely formed
tear blurred my reflection in the mirror.
I thought of the email I found printed on his desk while collecting his personal belongings. I had sent it a few weeks earlier to both my parents, trying to show off what I had learned in Chinese class. I wished I had called my dad more frequently. He had bought a new antenna so that he could get better cell phone reception after we had several conversations cut short. My mom told me how excited he would be to talk to me, when I called once every week or two. I really should have called more often.
It had been a rough week. Dealing with the death of a beloved family member is always difficult, but coping with the unexpected, abrupt, and violent end to my father's life was especially gut-wrenching. I had barely recognized my father's pale disfigured face on his lifeless body. I had seen his blood on the sidewalk, wall, and mailbox where he was murdered, his skull split and shattered by multiple blows from a steel machete. I had held his hand where the funeral home staff had sewn his thumb back on. I was uneasy with the thought that my father's murderer had escaped and was still not in custody.
I again rehearsed my eulogy in front of the mirror. I reflected upon the fact that my father was a great public speaker who loved to have any audience, and that I would be facing the largest audience I had ever addressed. I was not nervous, and found myself confident that a public speech should be easy for the oldest son of a man who thrived on public speaking. In this way, my father's memory allowed me to do what I had never been able to successfully do - give a memorized speech in front of a large audience of people I did not really know without nervous shaking in my voice or incoherent ramblings sprinkled into my speech.
My father is the man who taught me the importance of serving. He always wanted to improve the world and help the weak. One time when he was young, he drew attention to a man on a train for hitting his wife, screaming to all who could hear that "THIS MAN IS A WIFE BEATER! HE BEATS HIS WIFE! WIFE BEATER ON THE TRAIN!" He had the idealism of an adolescent and the boldness of a veteran salesman. He served in long term relief missions in Taiwan after the earthquake of 1999, and had plans to do the same in the HIV-infested Henan Province in China. He always wanted to help the poor in the United States, and stressed the importance of giving back to the society that had granted us the privileges we had. He rooted for the underdog in every sporting event not involving the Houston Rockets, and felt the same way about real life.
I miss my dad. I miss talking to him, and I miss trying to seek his approval while showing him some recent accomplishment. It didn't matter though; my father was proud of everything I did, even if it wasn't special or all that impressive. He embarassed me more than one time by bragging about my SAT and LSAT scores to my friends who outscored me. He often fought to give us whatever he perceived as the best - he put me in private school for 2 years because the public school district where I was wouldn't let me be in the gifted class without taking a test, and I only came back when I could be in the gifted class while I waited for the next testing cycle.
I hope my dad would be proud of what I do with my life. I think about advice he would be giving, and am reminded that it would be terrible to waste the talents and opportunities my father groomed for me to succeed. As I move forward past this tragedy in my life, I am constantly reminded to make full use of my own life, and I hope that I can live a life as full and fruitful as my father's.
Links:
Reverend
William Huang - A site which includes details about my father's
life and death, as well as all the latest updates in the search for
his murderer. Also, quite a few photographs and essays written about
my father are available through this site.
