As for man, his days are like grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourishes, for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place is no longer more. Psalm 103:15 (NKJV)
Today, November 18, would have been my dad’s 96th birthday. He passed away from the effects of cancer on June 11, 2024, just one day after my 66th birthday.
It was a whirlwind of spending time with dad from April this spring through to his funeral and burial on June 22, 2024. Nothing was easy as he lived in Southern Manitoba,, Canada and we live in Kansas, USA. Dad was determined to be as independent as he could be, until he had a fall in early April 2024 which sent him to the hospital and after an MRI he was told his cancer had spread. From then I spent weeks in Canada to arrange for him to move out of the hospital and into the nursing home my mom lives in, close his apartment, and tend to his needs as best I could. Then, carry out his funeral and burial.
Today I want to share my earliest memories of dad and acknowledge his impact on my life.
To read his obituary and learn more about him, go here.https://www.wiebefuneralhomes.com/obituaries/Peter-Friesen?obId=31810672&fbclid=IwY2xjawGoXHlleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHfOWlJsNpUUKF0LuqnV8aj0tMxjwwUDRpHDvDYIVY-OYhR8YplfYGno7fw_aem_ln4Akr5_Q9BvikOGee3Zyw
I was the first born of eventually three children.
Dad was attending Tabor College in Hillsboro, Kansas to finish his bachelor’s degree in music education from the time I was 1 year old – 5 years old. He taught piano and voice lessons in our home and worked full time as an auto mechanic at Reimer Ford Motors during these years as well as directed church choirs.
Me sitting on my dad’s lap with mom at about age 1 1/2. You can see his mechanic/piano hands!
My earliest memories of dad:
- Dad carrying me, covered by a blanket to church as he and mom walked the 1/2 block from their house.
- Of me sitting on his lap in church, or right next to him with his arm around me, and me playing with his large hand – fiddling with his wedding, ring, noticing the dark grease under his fingernails, and the smell of grease on his hands.
- Me falling out of bed at night, crying until dad came, picked me up and put me back in bed.
- Dad trying to distract me with a magazine photo while I was crying as I was waiting to get a penicillin shot in my behind at the doctor’s office, “Look, doesn’t this guy look like Uncle Duane?!” It didn’t work. I knew what was coming and wasn’t having it.
- Dad teaching piano and voice lessons in our home.
- Dad always finding out when I disobeyed him – which was frequently! Example: when I was 5 years old we lived in a big old house and the 2nd floor was a boy’s dorm for Tabor College. There was an outside closed wooden staircase up to the 2nd floor that shared a wall with the room dad taught lessons in. One day I convinced my sister (2 years younger) to sneak up the stairs, even though we were not allowed up there. When we nearly got to the top of the stairs I lost my nerve and turned to go back down, tripping and tumbling all the way down the stairs. I can still see my dad appear at the bottom of the stairs with a terribly concerned look on his face. I did not get in trouble for being disobedient that day. Dad was just relieved no one was seriously hurt!
- Sitting in the front right pew of the church during Sunday morning services at Ebenfeld Mennonite Brethren Church with dad and getting reprimanded for energetically swinging my short legs. From that pew he would go up on stage to lead congregational singing (hymns) and the church choir. Years later dad told me before that he had an earlier choir directing job at a church near Peabody, Kansas and he took me with him there too. On the first Sunday, I apparently followed him up on stage, crying. I hadn’t learned yet, the rest of my growing up years would include experiencing dad and mom in church choirs, and us sitting with others or eventually on our own, and finally, singing in his church choirs starting in high school.
- Me (about 4-5 yrs old) singing with mom at home “Oh Who Can Make A Rainbow, I’m Sure I Can’t Can You? The song continues, “Oh who can make a rainbow? No one but God ’tis true.” Following verses, insert other things like, bunny, sun, trees, etc. for “rainbow”. I can visualize the 1960’s book with that song in it and the illustrations. I do not remember singing the song at Ebenfeld church’s Christmas Eve service, where apparently I stood behind the piano to sing it as my first solo, and dad accompanied me. His friend, Jake Klassen (I was scared of him), gave me a quarter for singing!! Pretty sure I did it for the quarter.
- Dad calling me his “number one” daughter. I loved that role and was proud of him. Being the “daughter of Peter Friesen” was my identity in the small town I grew up in, Elbing, Kansas. There dad was head of the music department at Berean Academy, a small Christian high school. We moved there 1 month after my baby brother was born and I was 6 years old. We lived there through my growing up years, first in a school-owned house on campus, and later at the other end of town in a larger school-owned house. Dad grew a reputation of having “good choirs” and taught many students private piano and voice, organized and led choirs and small groups, and even band, not his specialty. When I was in 3rd grade he organized a community choral/orchestra presentation of Handel’s Messiah at Berean and brought in soloists from Canada – music friends he studied with during his earlier Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada days.
- Dad “working on cars” of friends, loaning them one of ours as he did.
- Dad always playing classical music at home on his large stereo. Choral, piano and orchestral music prevailed. He picked some of his favorite music for his funeral service, picking it for the beauty of the music and the message it shared. If you have Spotify you can listen to the music here. If not, find the titles and listen to them on Youtube.
https://open.spotify.com/embed/playlist/0qGZuVWN1RA00LaDt5zvTU?utm_source=generator
You can deduce from these memories, what was important to Dad. He threw himself fully into teaching, leading choirs at the schools, churches and communities he worked and lived in. I did not fully appreciate the impact growing up in his unique household had on me until I was much older. While dad was not a perfect man, and at times I resented the time he spent with students and helping others, I learned so much by absorbing the music in our home environment, recorded music and students’ lessons, and church music. The music became engrained in my mind and heart. I developed a “musical ear” and came to know how certain pieces should sound when years later I sang in dad’s choirs or played piano pieces I had heard his high school students play in our home. When I was in 7th grade dad started taking me to university and professional concerts along with his students. We always stayed up late at home and discussed the concert through which he taught me critical listening skills.
This original photo was a parting gift from Berean Academy, created by the Berean art teacher in 1973. Dad is conducting his last Spring Musical at Berean and the sheet music is from his favorite Rachmaninoff piano piece.
I also came to understand that dad’s immigrant upbringing in a poverty-stricken southern Manitoba farm family of 11 children affected him in ways he may not have ever fully realized. His father’s strict and even abusive behavior towards his family while maintaining a persona of a spiritual leader as a lay pastor in his community harmed the family relationships with each other and with God. However Dad did come to faith in God through evangelistic services when he was 18 years old and was able to forgive his father. As a child I was unaware that my dad struggled with anxiety and insomnia throughout his adult life, although anxiety wasn’t really acknowledged then. In his older years Dad shared with me that his desire to serve God through music was mixed up sometimes with his need for recognition and approval. As the “middle child” in his large family, he often tried to act as mediator and stayed in touch with his siblings as best he could into his final years, in spite of them living in British Columbia, Manitoba, Canada and California USA.
My dad sitting on his father’s lap, 2nd from right on middle row, with the extended Friesen family and 5 of his siblings around 1931.
It is hard to take in how much time has passed since my early years at home with dad. As I was going through his apartment for the first time after his hospitalization this past April 2024, I was struck by how short life seems at this end of it. Dad had photos in his apartment of many family members who have passed on – my mom’s grandparents, his parents, my brother Doug, people who no one will know in a few short generations. He had mementoes of his family, music teaching career and former students. His apartment was in order, ready for me to come and find pertinent information I would need to see him through the rest of his life and take care of mom after he was gone. The thoughts that came to mind the first time through his apartment come from Psalm 103:15,
As for man, his days are like grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourishes, for the wind passes over it, and it is gone, and its place is no longer more.
In his last months, some of our phone conversations reflected his frustration with his weakening physical abilities. His hearing was not good, and he couldn’t enjoy listening to his music like he used to. Long gone were the days when he could “work on cars” as they became computerized. He missed interacting with people and the role of “teacher” he had most of his life. He once said, “I am tired of being the old guy”, and expressed his desire to be with his Savior on the “other side” many times.
The experience of accompanying dad during his last weeks on earth have struck me with the brevity of life, and how when it is over it is over. There is no re-do. What we did in life stands as it is. No chance to make changes. No chance to say “I’m sorry”, or “I love you” one more time, or to experience or do something we didn’t do. I am thankful that I was able to be there and support dad with my presence and efforts on his behalf, and to pray with him and say “I love you”. As a dear friend recently said, “I don’t miss their (our parents’) older selves as much as who they were when we were kids.” That sense of love and security that our parents and our small, close community provided is where we learned and grew.
To go back to Psalm 103, it also includes encouragement that God’s mercy towards his children is “as high as the heavens are above the earth”, and that He has “compassion on those who fear (respect) Him. For He knows our frame. He remembers that we are but dust.” From Psalm 103:17-18,
But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting, to those who fear (revere) Him, and His righteousness to children’s children, to such as keep His covenant, and to those who remember His commandments to do them.
God’s gift of eternal life is available to all who persevere in faithfulness to Him. God knows that “We are weak, but He is strong.” His mercy endures forever. Amen and Amen. Dad, may your memory be eternal. I trust God’s mercy will bring us together again at the last trumpet, when the dead in Christ shall rise to eternal life with Christ in His eternal kingdom. From Revelation 21:3-4,
And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, “Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men (humankind), and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them and be their God. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away…behold I make all things new…I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him (they who thirsts. He who overcomes shall inherit all things, and I will be his (their) God.”
I am thankful to my family for their support during dad’s last days and following – especially my husband Robert, sister Susan, sister-in-law Monica, my aunt Sandy and Uncle Ron, my cousins Eric and Bob, and myriad of friends in Canada, at home and friends, family and dad’s former students on facebook. Thank you for your love, prayers, and physical expressions of care and help. I am deeply grateful.
Dad, God be with you till we meet again.
Doug grilling for one of our visits during his illness.
Siblings Susan, Doug, Jenny (author)
High school senior photo, Freeman Academy, Freeman, SD
Doug touring with the WBI Choir
Original cassette tape Digitally re-recorded cd
Words from a Sparrow 