88

Today is my father’s birthday. Lynn Otto Poulson would have been 88 today. Dad, a towering figure in many more lives than mine, was devoted to cars, to proper grammar, to stories of family history, to his church, and to the Boy Scouts of America.

Dad’s influence in my life was supreme - the glow of his approval made any effort worthwhile. But when I made choices that worried him (like walking away from my fancy PR agency job at 50 to start my own business), his uncensored anxiety invaded my bloodstream.

“Human decency,” he’d say to me when I was summoned to the workbench in his garage for a talk about being a mean teenager, which was often, “You have to treat people with human decency.”

When I was a baby PR person in New York, I called to ask him how I should record on my expense report the $27 that was not in my wallet when I returned from a business trip, but for which I had no receipts. I said, “Maybe I can add it to another item on the expense report.” I was stressed. In my life in 1989, $27 was a lot.

He said, “Is your integrity worth just $27?”

I did not fudge my expense report.

The man who taught me to tie my shoelaces and how to hold a pencil would choke up when he’d call on my birthday. He’d say, “I remember when I first saw you, in the hospital nursery. Your little hand was stuck in your sleeve. I could see your frustration - you didn’t know how to free yourself. I wanted so badly to fix it for you, but I could only watch from the other side of the glass.”

The last time I saw my father was about six weeks before he died in 2017. I flew to see him without specifying that it was a ‘goodbye visit’. No one knew when the tumor and related crises would take him. I didn't want him to suspect that my visit signaled a belief that his death was imminent. Still, I knew it might be, so when I left for the airport I put my hand over his, kissed him on the forehead and told him I loved him. I didn’t cry.

After we buried him, I flew home, got in my car at SFO and started to drive. But as soon as I hit 101 North, I felt a colossal disorientation. I didn’t know where I was going, because the map of my world was no longer on the planet with me.

I had the courage to start my own business in 2013 because of my dad. I run it the way I do because of my dad. I strive to be a net positive to the world because of my dad. So, today, on what would have been his 88th birthday, I hope you’ll join me in celebrating him.