My father-in-law, David Robertson passed away on 11 November 2014. As part of his funeral service I delivered the following short speech in his memory. I post it here for anyone who knew Dave and was unable to make his service.
My name is Armen Pogharian. I’m one of Dave’s Sons-in-law. Some of you may know this story, but I think it bears repeating. I actually met Dave before I met his daughter Cathy, who eventually became my wife. I was co-captain of my swim team in college and we swam Plattsburgh. Occasionally, our coach would ask us to meet the other team’s coach, shake hands, wish each other luck, that type of thing. We didn’t do this with every opposing coach. In fact we only did it with those few coaches who’d earned Coach Lep’s respect. Dave Robertson was one of those few coaches. And while neither of us knew it, we had more than swimming in common.
More than four years later I accompanied Cathy to her house to meet her parents. I’d met girls’ parents before. Many of those meetings followed the stereotypical path of father maneuvering his daughter’s suitor into a one-on-one situation so he can check him out. As I’m sure he planned, I found myself alone with Dave in the family living room. It was pretty clear that I was in love with his daughter and that she had similar feelings for me. I expected Dave to open with one of the traditional don’t you hurt my daughter routines. But he didn’t. Instead, he asked me if I remembered when we first met. He not only remembered me, he even remembered what I swam. That small gesture on his part broke the tension. Make no mistake about it he checked me out, but he did it without needing to use intimidation.
So why did I tell you this story, because it illustrates the two of the things that were most important to Dave; his passion for education and learning and his love for his children. People know that Dave’s career involved teaching and coaching, but it was more than a career for him. It was part of who he was. It goes beyond his formal Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Doctorate degrees. Great achievements, to be sure, but his commitment went beyond formal learning. He wasn’t the type of guy who let others do what he thought he could learn to do for himself. Dave was always doing and learning new things. Nothing was off the table, everything from splitting a trailer load of tree length logs to power the family’s wood stoves for the winter to jacking up the roof of their 150 year old farmhouse to get it back into position. No job was too big for him to tackle. It could be farming, working on old tractors, sail boats, power boats, French or many other subjects; he just couldn’t stand still. It may sound odd, but he was a pragmatic dreamer. I may not have always thought his projects were wise and I certainly didn’t understand his desire to do many of them, but I always admired his dedication to his dreams.
If he wasn’t learning, he was teaching or sharing his knowledge with others. While that might seem an obvious thing for a man who spent his entire professional career in education, that’s not really what I mean. Teaching was not just his career it was also the way he expressed his love for the people he cared about. He taught his children basic car maintenance and made them prove they could change a tire or in Cathy’s case rotate them – before letting them take a car to college. Deals were one of his favorite things to share. If you wanted to know where to find the best deal on almost anything, Dave was your man. If you were traveling through nearly any small town in upstate, chances were good that Dave could tell you about a great restaurant, hotel, or even the cheapest gas.
But he was more than just bargains. Every year for Christmas I could count on receiving a book from Dave. One year the letters of Robert E. Lee, another, the history of college football stadiums and several books about technology tycoons. I’m sure he was hoping I could emulate Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. To be sure that hope wasn’t just for me, but for his daughter. Like all good fathers he always wanted the best for his children and was always quick to offer advice or help on whatever projects or problems they were facing.
In addition to the numerous manuals, how-to, history and railroad books his own reading included the daily ritual of the comics, which touches on Dave’s unique and somewhat silly sense of humor. Nothing brought a smile to his face faster than the one panel pictures of aliens, dinosaurs, mad scientists or especially cows that frequented his favorite, The Far Side. The Far Side desktop calendar was a gift that you knew would bring a daily smile to his face and give him one more thing to tape onto his fridge.
Besides a father and an educator, Dave was also a grandfather – eight times over no less. Because of distance or their passing early in my life I have only a few memories of my grandparents. Oh I remember holidays, a trip on the trolley to the toy store, and other special events, but I don’t really remember them. It’s a hole or a gap that I feel inside, something I didn’t want my own children to feel.
This past summer Dave took my family out on his boat. A little over a mile out of the marina, the engine failed. Grandpa tried several different ways to start the motor, but couldn’t. He couldn’t easily get to the anchor, but he directed me to it. Unfortunately we’d drifted into water too deep for the anchor to stop our slow yet steady drift to the shores of Vermont. Our plans for a picnic and a swim on the beach were dashed. Eventually we had to be towed back to the marina. Dave viewed the excursion as a failure and repeatedly apologized. I understood his feelings, but the truth of the matter is I think it turned out just fine. Sure we never made it to the beach, but we got something much more valuable – time with grandpa. While we wallowed in the middle of Lake Champlain, we watched the ferries make their rounds, looked at beautiful boats sailing by, and Dave rolled out his charts and taught my kids how to read them and use visual cues to figure out where we were. In short, my kids got something far better than a day at the beach. They got one more great adventure with their grandpa.