An Unremarkable Man

He came into the world on a breezy spring evening. The third kid of an insurance salesman and a part-time bus driver. Eight pounds, twenty inches.

An unremarkable birth.

He told dumb knock-knock jokes, got himself in trouble in Sunday school now and then, and tagged along behind his older brother and sister. He once hauled in an eighteen-pound catfish. Big, sure, but still unremarkable.

He played right field in Little League and second string tackle on the high school football team. He never made the dean’s list. But he worked real hard to fill up his report card with solid B’s.

He was an unremarkable student.

He went to the local state college, fell in love with a girl his buddies said “looked all right,” and graduated with a 3.5 GPA with a degree in History. He got a minor that was in something unremarkable, like Poli sci or English.

He married that girl in a modest church. They honeymooned at an unremarkable 3.5-star hotel in Myrtle Beach.

They bought a split-level on 3/4 of an acre. Three bedrooms, unfinished basement. Good neighborhood. Fourth of July block parties. Christmas lights every year. The kind of place that was nice, dependable, and completely unremarkable.

God gave them four children: two boys, two girls. She stayed home most years and picked up shifts at Macy’s during the holidays. The kids were fed, clothed, loved, and kept on track. They did well in school and sports, but like their dad, they lived squarely in the unremarkable middle of things.

The years added up. Her wrinkles showed where she laughed and squinted. His hair thinned and grayed. His body softened. Nothing dramatic. Just the slow drift of an unremarkable life.

Eventually the kids headed out and built their own unremarkable families.

Then on his seventieth birthday, cancer finally cornered him. He went home to the Lord with his wife holding his hand, his children and their spouses, and fourteen grandchildren gathered around him.

At the funeral, they came…

from college, from the office, from the neighborhood, from all over town. They lined up, one by one, and said the same thing:

“He was a remarkable man.”