The Man I Still Look Up To | A Tribute to My Father

I was spoiled. I’ll just say it.
Not in the way that ruins a kid, except maybe a little. I got just about everything I ever wanted. And I won’t pretend that it didn’t leave a mark. To this day, I still have to fight that voice that says, “If you want it, go get it.” Life has a way of reminding you that’s not always how it works.
But spoiled as I was, I was never allowed to be soft. Dad made sure of that.
His name was Murl Davis. He was my father, my coach, my best friend, and my hero.
I’m the youngest. By the time I came along, my brother and sisters were already grown and gone. So in a lot of ways, I grew up in that house like an only child. Just me and my parents. Looking back now, I think Dad knew that. I think he saw me as something like a second chance. A chance to pour everything he had into one more kid before it was over. I don’t know what mistakes he made before me. I don’t need to know. What I know is that man gave me everything he had.
And I felt every bit of it.

My Dad, My Coach

Every summer, I played baseball. I was a pitcher, and Dad made sure I practiced.
Almost daily during baseball season, unless he had worked over and was too tired, we were out in the side yard practicing pitching. And honestly, it seemed like he was tired all the time because he worked so much. But tired or not, most days we were still out there.
I didn’t really have a choice.
That was Dad.
He believed if you were going to do something, you worked at it. You didn’t just show up on game day and hope it all worked out. You practiced. You listened. You improved. You took the correction. And then you went back out and tried again.
During the games, he paid attention. He watched everything. And afterward, he would always tell me where I needed to improve. Not because he was trying to tear me down, but because he believed I could get better. He expected something out of me.
I remember one year, my coach decided not to use me as a pitcher for a certain game. Dad took issue with that. I remember seeing him and the coach arguing about it. I didn’t intervene. I really didn’t want any part of that conversation, and I was smart enough to stay out of it. But the following year, Dad made sure I didn’t play for that coach again.
That was my dad, too.
He pushed me, but he also stood up for me.
And after the games, ice cream was a must. That was part of it. Baseball, correction, encouragement, maybe a little argument with a coach if Dad thought it was needed, and then ice cream.
It always felt good looking over and seeing my parents on the sidelines. Sometimes my brother was there too. It felt like I had my own cheering section. I may not have understood it fully back then, but I understand it now.
That kind of support stays with a kid.
And when I say my dad was my coach, I don’t just mean baseball. He coached me in life. He taught me to work, to compete, to listen, to improve, and to keep showing up.

He Taught Me by How He Lived

He was always working.
The garden, and there were several little patches of land he had leased or borrowed through friends, was part of life. He would drag me out there when I was young, and I could not stand it. Sun on my neck. Dirt under my fingernails. I didn’t understand why we couldn’t just buy vegetables like everybody else.
I understand now.
When he wasn’t in the garden, he was working around the house. Or helping the neighbors. If something needed doing, Dad was already doing it. He didn’t wait to be asked. He didn’t need recognition. He just worked. Steady, consistent, and without a word of complaint.
That’s not something you teach with words. You have to show it.
He showed it every single day.
My brother and I both inherited that. His work ethic didn’t die with him. It walked out of that house in us, and it’s still walking.

The Fire in Him

Dad had no fear. I never once saw that man back down from anything.
You already got a glimpse of that with the coach. Dad didn’t pull me aside after the game and say he disagreed with the decision. He walked over and said it to the man’s face. I stayed far away from that conversation. I was smart enough to know my place. But I watched it. And I filed it away.
He was stubborn. Lord, was he stubborn. If you’ve ever met a Davis with a temper, now you know exactly where it comes from. But here’s what I learned watching him. The same fire that made him hard to argue with made him impossible to doubt. He didn’t say things he didn’t mean. If he told you something, you could build on it.
You didn’t lie to my dad. Not just because you were scared, although maybe a little, but because he had earned something from you.
Real respect. The kind you don’t fake.

Friday Nights and Family

Friday nights were something special.
Mom and Dad would play spades with my uncle and aunt. Card games and conversation filled up the house. Or my brother and his wife, Beverly, would come over, and I would be so excited I could not contain myself. That meant I got to sit in the same room as my dad and my brother and just listen. Just soak it all in. I felt like I was getting away with something just being in there.
My brother is fifteen years older than me. He would tease me and poke fun at the way brothers do, and I loved every second of it. I would give it right back. The only problem was that I was a lot younger and didn’t know when to quit. Or plainly didn’t want to. It would aggravate Dad. He would warn me to stop picking. I would, for about five minutes, and then I would be right back at it. Dad would be trying to have a real conversation with my brother, and here I came, interrupting again.
I’m not complaining about any of it.
Those are some of my best memories.
I remember shooting pool in my brother’s basement, feeling like one of the men. Beverly would make an unforgettable meal, and we would all sit down together as a family and eat. Those were my favorite Fridays. And when they came to our house, Mom would prepare the meal, and all the same things would happen. Same love, same noise, same excitement I could not hold in.

He Loved His Family Fiercely

Dad loved his family fiercely.
I remember watching him when my brother Graylyn would pull in the driveway. Dad would go straight out to help gather up the kids and their things and get everybody in the house. That was just who he was.
And he had a huge special place in his heart for Beverly.
When Beverly was diagnosed with cancer, and the result of it meant losing her leg and her hip, I watched it almost break my father. He hurt so badly for her. He didn’t want her to go through that. I remember the conversations he would have with Mom about Beverly. That man felt things deeply, even when he didn’t always show it.
He worried about my sisters, too. They had married and moved out of state, and we didn’t see them nearly enough. That weighed on him.
But when the whole family was together, look out.
He would be chasing the grandkids around the house. One time, he took his false teeth out and chomped them at the kids like they were going to bite. I was laughing so hard I could barely breathe.
That was Dad.
Serious when it called for serious. But when it was time to play, that man played.

The Little Things I Still Remember

On Christmas Eve, we would pile in the car and drive around looking at Christmas lights. When we got back home, Santa had already delivered the presents. At least that’s what I thought.
Dinner was on the table at 6 o’clock. Every day. And when that fire whistle went off, you better not have been late. I’ll leave that right there. You did not make my dad wait for dinner.
I can still see him in his rusty red rocking recliner. Swisher Sweet cigar. Westerns on TV. And anytime Billy Graham came on, that man stopped everything and watched.
Every single time.
He didn’t go to church with Mom and me. Mom was the most devoted Southern Baptist woman I have ever known. When those church doors were open, we were there. But not Dad. At least not in person. On Sundays, when we would get home from church, he would be watching a service on television. And Billy Graham never missed our living room.
I questioned that growing up. Especially considering my mom loved the Lord and proclaimed it daily. Sometimes by the hour. And I am not exaggerating. So Dad really didn’t have a choice in the matter.
But here’s what I know now.
My dad knew God. I know it in my heart. He just kept that relationship more private. And maybe, just maybe, the way he lived was his sermon.
He never stood behind a pulpit. But he showed his faith in the way he lived, the way he worked, and the way he took care of the people he loved. He helped my mom’s parents purchase their home in Arkansas. He planned to retire from Ford Motor Company and go back home to Arkansas someday.
He showed up.
Every time.
For everyone.

Arkansas Memories

Speaking of Arkansas, some of my best memories were made there.
Every trip, we made rounds visiting as many families as we could. And I noticed something even as a kid. Every room we walked into, people lit up when Dad walked through the door. They respected him. They loved him. They looked up to him the same way I did.
That’s not something you manufacture.
That’s a life well lived, showing up everywhere he went.
I remember sitting on the swing with Dad and my grandfather while my uncle stretched out in a lawn chair. The stories they told. The things they talked about. I was just a boy sitting there trying to absorb every word. I felt like one of the guys. Like I was sitting with real men, and they were letting me in.
I caught my first bass on one of those trips. And I remember begging to go hunting with Dad and my uncle, only to be told I was too young.
I didn’t handle that well. What I wanted wasn’t the hunting. It was to be counted. To be one of them. To walk out into the dark with my dad and come back with a story we both owned. I just didn’t have the words for it then.
But he was protecting me even when I thought he was leaving me out. I know that now. And honestly, I think he knew what I really wanted. He just knew I wasn’t ready yet.

What I Inherited

I also inherited something else from my father.
His heart condition.
I found that out the hard way. And when I did, the first thing I thought about was him. Not the diagnosis. Him.
He didn’t take care of his. I take care of mine. That’s not a criticism of the man. That’s just the truth, and he would want me to say it plainly. It’s one of the ways I honor him now, by doing what he didn’t. By staying around longer for the people who need me the way I needed him.
I didn’t have him long enough.
I know that now, in a way I couldn’t have understood as a boy.
But what he planted in me, the work ethic, the honesty, the stubbornness when it counts, and the way you love your family without making a speech about it, none of that left when he did.
It never will.
“Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it.”
— Proverbs 22:6 (NLT)

A Prayer

Lord, thank You for men like my dad. For fathers who work hard and love harder. For the lessons we didn’t understand until years later. For the gardens we hated as kids that we wish we could go back to now. For Friday nights and card games and families crowded around a dinner table. For Arkansas swings and first bass and men who let little boys sit with them and just listen.
If there is someone reading this who has a father like mine, help them stop and be grateful today. And if someone reading this did not have that kind of father, remind them that You can still plant those things in them. It is never too late to become the man somebody else will one day look up to.
Amen.