Eulogy of David Horst Sr.

David John Jacob Horst Sr.
May 6, 1928 - June 26, 2013

My family has suffered a tremendous loss.  We could see it coming from a long way off, but that didn't make it any less of a shock.  When the phone rang at 3:30 in the morning, it could mean only one thing -- what we thought was just days left with him turned out to be only hours.

Still,  I'm fortunate to have had him for 56 years.  Maybe he knew I was going to take that long to shape.   More likely it was that he knew my sister Jane would take nearly 60 years.

Most of what's best about me came from him.  My calm, my patience were his gifts.  That I know a crescent wrench from an open end and can use them to replace a fuel pump or bleed a brake line is his doing.  I got most of what we'll call his attention to detail.  Others might use the word perfectionist.   His blue eyes,  he kept for himself.  His instant and uncanny sense of direction I didn't inherit either. 

Jane has his caring nature and dedication to family.  She probably could have driven around the globe with all of the miles she put on driving between Appleton and Milwaukee in the past year.

Life no longer offered much for Dad.  He couldn't putter around in the garage or even remember how to do car repairs that he could have done blindfolded before.   Jane's husband, Scott, helped him extend that time a bit, but finally the workings of a car became a mystery to Dad.

His legs didn't support him.  His esophagus could no longer tell the path to the stomach from the one to the lungs.  Most cruelly, his mind was failing him.  He couldn't remember where he had put things.  Eventually, he couldn't remember the meaning of words.

But this was still the man who taught us everything that really matters -- how to treat people, how to stand by your word, how to stand up for what's right and how to take the consequences when you've done wrong.

Inside was the man who lived in love with our mother for 60 years.  The body wasn’t able, but the spirit still wanted to spin someone around the dance floor fast enough to lift her off her feet -- as he had done with Jane at father-daughter dances, to Renee at her wedding and Jean at ours. I took the advice of a friend to "treasure the moments" when the man inside would show through.

He was born into a tough life, one of nine children of German immigrants.  His education ended at the eighth grade.  There may have been a time in my snotty teens when I saw shame in that, but I know now that the measure of success is not how much of a head start your education gives you, but the distance you travel after it.

Dad turned his eight years of learning into mastery of a respected and valued trade.  By age 16 he could double-clutch a dump truck.  If you don't know what that means, a valuable slice of life has been hidden from you.

As an operating engineer, he could translate a flick of the wrist into hundreds of feet of boom moving a giant concrete pipe exactly where it needed to be.  He could make a mound of dirt flat, perfectly flat. I've tried and I can't.

During one hospital visit, he was not understanding much of anything until we told the nurse what he did for a living. "Operating Engineer," he repeated, loud and proud.

He was the dad in the neighborhood that other kids were afraid of. It's not at all that he was mean.  He just had clear ideas about what was acceptable behavior for kids and was not afraid to point out when one was stepping over the line -- no matter whose kid it was.  "Hey you kids!" would stop bad behavior in its tracks. I still can’t slam a car door. Scottie once did in Dad’s presence and received an instant lesson in how to close a car door “without taking it off the hinges.”

The retirement years revolved around his old car, a 1958 Ford Retractable, black, with fender skirts and a continental kit.  Many weekends were devoted to car shows, parades and car conventions. Governors, congressmen, generals and the Fonz's friends Potsie and Ralph rode in his old car. 

He hooked up a remote and would sit in his lawn chair at car shows and amaze children by making the roof collapse into the trunk, seemingly all on its own.  A week before his passing, he got one last ride in his car thanks to Jimmy and Renee.  His dementia even allowed him to believe he had done the driving.

The best advice he ever gave me was, "Why don't you ask out that cute little one?"  That advice turned into 33 years of marriage for me and a daughter-in-law he loved.

Long before the dementia wore down his brain, my Dad had trouble expressing certain words, the ones attached to emotion.  But we knew with complete certainty that we were loved and are sure he knew it, too.  We said it in other ways.

His final gift to us was a new closeness as a family, nurtured during these challenging months.  His illness also revealed the generosity of friends, relatives and neighbors who have been so helpful in getting our Mom through this.  We thank them and the kind and caring staff here at St. Anne's.

Pneumonia, the last of many infections, finally took him from us Wednesday.

The aching legs, the aspirating, the confusion, the frustration, the feeling of not being of any use are gone.  He lives on in me.  He lives on in Jane and her kids and their kids.  He lives on in the lessons he taught us and the example he lived.  He lives on in the many people he touched with kindness.  He lives on in my mother's love for him, which could easily have lasted another 60 years.

His life is summed up in what so many of you have told us: "He was such a good man."  We'll be all right Dad.  You gave us what we need.  Now it's time for you to have the peace you have earned.