Before his death at age 88, I was the only one he recognized. By then, he couldn't speak. My last words were, "I love you, Tatteleh (affectionate Yiddish for father)." To this day, I tell myself he heard me.

He was a lawyer. But when his father told him to manage the family shoe business, he quit his practice and obeyed. He ran it for 40 years, and hated it.

Dad had a spinal disorder I recently found out I've inherited. Most of his movements were grueling. He needed a back brace to support his spine. Luckily for me, I had surgery that helped enormously.

As a teen, I wasn't allowed to date non-Jewish boys or have Christian girlfriends. But I married a Gentile man. Dad, a devout Orthodox Jew, adored Bob. When he saw how much we loved each other, that was what mattered. Regardless of what Bob did for work, like selling plants, Dad would ask, "Is he happy?" He endearingly called him Mister Farmer.

He wouldn't have me feel sorry for him. When he fell down the night before my wedding, he said to Bob, "Don't tell Saralee." He escorted me down the aisle, though he needed a walker. Two days later, he became wheelchair bound for good. I believe it was his determination to walk with me that kept his disability at bay until then.

Dad had a code of ethics. "Everything in moderation." And, "No self pity." Mother was mean, but he'd never sass back. When I did, he'd say, "Never talk to your mother that way." And clothes? He was always properly dressed, even to get the mail. He hated my stylishly torn jeans. And when I announced that one of my college roommates was a boy? Oy vey, did he have a fit.

Thankfully, he died before I became disabled. He'd have been heartbroken to see me in my wheelchair. But he would have been overjoyed that I had surgery, so I wouldn't be crippled like him.

At his burial, I touched the hand-carved Jewish star on the wooden casket that held my father's body. But it didn't hold his soul. When the rabbi handed me a trowel filled with soil for me to sprinkle on the coffin, I kept that little piece of earth. It stays on my bureau in Dad's milkglass shaving mug.

We still "talk" together. This morning, I looked toward heaven. "Tatteleh, I have the life you wanted for me. I love my work. I can walk a little, with no pain. And my husband adores me like you did." I felt choked up. "Thank you for loving me so much that you never once mentioned Bob wasn't Jewish. And although you never showed it, I know how sad you felt that our own rabbi wouldn't perform the wedding."

I "heard" him say, "Shaineh maideleh (his pretty little girl), are you happy?"

"Yes, Dad. You taught me that's what matters." I began crying. "I wish you had been happy."

"You filled my heart with happiness."

And in so many ways he did, and still does, mine.