Sticking With My Father on John Hinckley
What was good enough for my father is good enough for me.
He was one of those rare people who didn’t just recite “The Lord’s Prayer,” he lived it.
When he asked God the Father to “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us,” he meant it.
I’m not going to be angry for the rest of my life at a mentally disturbed guy who tried to take my father’s life. My father didn’t hate Hinckley, why should I?
He was never a hateful or vengeful man – even after almost dying from an assassin’s bullet.
In private, and with his family, he was the same affable guy who quipped to Nancy “Honey, I forgot to duck” and said to the emergency room doctors “I hope you’re all Republicans.”
To prove what I say, here’s a loose retelling of the conversation I had with him six hours after he got off the operating table at George Washington University Hospital.
When my wife Colleen and I walked into his room, my dad looked up at me from his bed and said, “Mike, if you’re ever going to get shot, don’t be wearing a new suit.”
“Excuse me?”
“Well, yesterday I was shot.”
...continued
Copyright 2021 Michael Reagan, All Rights Reserved. Credit: Cagle.com
