Biscuit

 My father called me "Biscuit." And he was the only one.

He liked the way I savored three buttered biscuits with honey at dinner time.

I think it showed him there were certain things I wanted out of life.

And, perhaps because I was gangly and slight, he wanted to encourage that personal claim.

One Christmas, in 1966, my father gave me a set of red wooden skis.  They were perfect, in their way.  Shellacked like polished apples.  Unblemished.  The bindings shining in polished silver.  I was four years old, and I viewed them with awe.

The following week, he took our family to Pat's Peak, where he spent the entire first day skiing down the mountain while holding me between his own skis, snow-ploughing in a giant S down the slope.

I had realized, by the age of four, that my father was regarded by all who knew him as an important man.

I had also realized that he could have paid for me to have a beginning ski lesson.

Instead, he wanted to show me something about how we help each other navigate the inclines.

I was mindful, even at the time, of his choice.  It was generous, protective, and abundantly loving -- all three.

And, in truth, it was one of hundreds of examples of his parenting of me in which he conveyed that he thought I could manage something about which I might have been uneasy at first.

He thought I could swim all the way across the cold mountain lake.  He thought I could learn how to jump a fence on horseback.  He thought I could race a sailboat and win.

He offered his encouragements with a wink, and he called me "Biscuit" when he spoke them.

And he was always right.

I did do all those things, along with meeting a bevy of challenges that were considerably harder.

All of which is to say that I think my father understood the soul of leadership.

People rise to their best when they are unreasonably loved, unfailingly encouraged, guided to undertake the difficult, mysterious adventures that promise to teach them something new.

Whenever I hear President Biden speak to the American people, I hear him guiding us in the same way.

He knows that certain challenges are formidable, but he also believes we can meet them.  And behind those words of good faith and guidance, his great love for this nation is evident.

Like my father, President Biden is both a good man and a great one -- a man of good faith, insight, integrity, and abiding hope for the future.

Our nation's good fortune in claiming him as our Commander-in-Chief at this crossroads in our democracy represents a rare gift -- a shining chance that our freedoms may endure.

The electorate may need that gifts further explained.

The necessity for everyone to help our nation answer democracy's call is pressing and profound, as President Biden has explained.  He believes the electorate needs to know why.

If I can help, I want to answer that call.

A great and noble man once called me "Biscuit," and another great and noble man is calling Americans to our best once more.

So, I would be honored to try.

Lane MacWilliams