Just in case you ever wondered how you did as a parent, here’s my life, through my eyes.

By the time I was 4, I could swim in the creek, catch minnows in the pond, climb the apple tree, and ride a pony named Dolly.

My Dad taught me how.

By the time I was 5, I could chop wood out in the old shed where the big spiders lived, hunt birds with a BB gun (Mom cut notches in the barrel with an old file to record my success), and grease my own flat-top.

My Dad taught me how.

By the time I was 6, I could reach under a rock, find a hellgrammite and bait my own hook. I could ride a bike, shoot a slingshot, build a campfire and skip a rock on Flathead Lake.

My Dad taught me how.

When I was 7, I also rode a snow machine around the yard by myself (unintentionally, of course), rode a calf (for .06 seconds, at least), and could climb the tallest pine tree in the neighborhood. I also drove in an open-door Jeep through the floodwaters of Evergreen. After we moved to town, I learned to skin a muskrat in the dark confines of the Fernwell crawlspace, hunt grasshoppers down by the railroad tracks and catch sunfish in the ponds at Woodland Park.

My Dad taught me how.

By the time I was 8, I could build a plastic model airplane, skin a beaver (without too many holes), and play baseball. I could also do more chin-ups than any other kid in the neighborhood, ride the train to Whitefish and spot a deer a mile away (for a quarter, and after I got my glasses).

My Dad taught me how.

By the time I reached 9, I had shot a grouse with a .410, hunted rabbits and gophers with a .22, and bagged a squirrel with a BB gun in the woods across from the old Lion’s Campground. I could swim like a fish, do a “jackknife” off the diving board at the deep end and swim the length of the pool at Hungry Horse, underwater. I could also build a balsa wood model airplane, clean a shotgun, skin a mink (finally!) and set a leg trap without getting my fingers caught (usually).

Yeah, you guessed it: My Dad taught me how.

Before I reached 10, I had driven the ALCAN Highway in midwinter, seen a huge black wolf standing in the middle of the road, experienced an Alaskan spring breakup, commercially fished on a converted sailboat in Bristol Bay and hoisted a 50-pound king salmon into the freezer.

My Dad took me there.

When I was 11, I had already pole fished in the Copper River, climbed Flattop Mountain, ridden in a Piper Super Cub and eaten moose meat. I had searched the Naknek River banks for old tires for the boat, hitched rides to the municipal payphone at midnight and learned how to enjoy coffee and canned salmon at mug-up. I could change a spark plug, pound cotton into a boat seam and operate a hydraulic roller. I could read a depth finder, spot a seal, use a CB radio and cling to the roof of a bouncing boat on a stormy, foggy night, while holding a spotlight in one hand and warming myself on the exhaust with the other.

My Dad took me there and taught me how to do it.

When I was 12, I spent a night in the middle of February in an old station wagon up by Delta Junction, eating cold MREs from Marvin Cook and wearing someone’s old whitey-tightey long johns as “winter camo.”

My Dad helped me shoot a caribou.

When I was 13, I helped build two houses and shot myself in the hand with a

nail gun. Dad pulled out the nail with pliers. I wrestled in the winter, hiked in the summer and learned how to ride an old motorcycle that Drac bought. I learned how to change a flat tire, use a Vise-Grip and shoot ducks on the mudflats.

Yeah, Dad taught me that.

When I lost to Doug Hotes in the city championships, Dad was there.

When I woke up in the boat with my hand in water, Dad was there.

When we had to bail the boat with buckets and tin cans, Dad was there.

When Drac threw the king overboard, Dad was mad and let him know about it.

Dad was always there.

While I was in high school, I shot a caribou with my bow. Dad took me.

I’ve flown through and over the Alaskan Wrangell Mountains and dropped hunting gear out the open door of an airplane. I’ve walked on glaciers a thousand years old, crossed swollen mountain streams where falling in meant likely death and loaded my sisters’ backpack with rocks just for the fun of it.

Dad took me.

I’ve crossed the Cook Inlet and watched brown bears play on the beach in Pile Bay while we waited for the tide to rise to cross the mountains on a road so narrow the billy goats wore seat belts. I’ve traveled the length of Lake Iliamna in Alaska and down the richest salmon-producing river in the world. I’ve flown over more moose and caribou, more black and brown bears and more salmon than most people can imagine. Dad took me with him.

I’ve skinned a moose, cut frozen flesh from a caribou for dog food in the middle of winter and had my bed sheets freeze to the wall. I’ve watched Dad fix a broken block on a Chrysler car with a metal plate, some screws and a patch of leather. I’ve taken apart a 460 Ford engine and put it back together again in the back of a boat. I made an electromagnet out of some wire and a quarter-inch drive extension to recover a bolt from the bottom of an oil pan. Dad taught me how.

I’ve swum under a boat in freezing water to free snagged nets and run over those same nets going 50 mph in a crazy-fast jet boat. Those things happen when you let Dad drive.

I’ve spent 45 minutes with Drac trying to get a bank teller to give us change in Federal Reserve Notes instead of just dollars. I’ve run a trapline by Talkeetna from snow machines when it was 40 degrees below zero and spent the night in a pup tent — with Dad.

I’ve hopped on an old Can-Am motorcycle and sped off in the darkness to fill old oil cans with gas and dirt to light the runway with mini-torches of wavering light — for Dad.

I’ve bow hunted deer in Utah on my way to college — with Dad.

Dad, you’ve expressed remorse because you didn’t write much when I was in school. That’s OK. I didn’t have much time to read then, anyway, cause I was pretty busy in college. I was able to go to school because you paid me well for my summer fishing job.

I bought a Porsche 911 to ride around in because you loaned me 10 or 12 grand to buy it. I drove that Porsche to Pennsylvania for Thanksgiving, to Florida for spring break and to Colorado for Christmas.

You took me skiing at Breckenridge, and Wolf Creek Pass, and Monarch, and Keystone. Then I drove the Porsche to Alaska.

You took my buddy Brent and I hunting in your airplane — no cost, no fee, no trouble.

You and Max also flew to Canada to bring me parts when my Porsche broke down on the way back to college. After that, you took Lonita and I javelina hunting in Arizona.

You always had my back. You always came to my rescue.

Then I graduated college.

You didn’t help much after I graduated college and went to law school.

Well, except for letting me fish every summer so I could afford to go to law school, and letting me take your Scout from California to Arizona so I would have a car that first year, and visiting me in Tucson a couple of times and taking me to the steakhouse where they cut your tie off, and letting me live at home the summer of 1988 while I was doing my internship, and letting me bring my Bar study materials on the fishing boat after I graduated so I could study for the Bar Exam, and on and on...

Oh, did I forget to mention that you let me use your $50,000 airplane as a trainer? Or the fact that I wrecked it, and you and Frank fixed it, for just the cost of the parts because I had a new baby and a nervous wife?

Have I ever thanked you for helping me move up and down the ALCAN Highway several times? Or letting me fish the old Think Or Thwim on my own right out of high school? Or arranging to fix the car I damaged when my first Volkswagen wheel came off while I was towing it home and I didn’t have insurance? Yeah, probably not.

I regret not making sure you knew how wonderful the ride has been.

Did you ever wonder why I drug your old newspaper clipping box all around the country with me — to college, to law school, to Alaska, Montana and all points in between?

I needed to keep a little part of you with me wherever I went.

DAD: If you ever wonder, I have had an incredible childhood and life. You have provided me the opportunity to do things, go places and experience a world that most people only dream about. Whatever skills, knowledge or abilities I have, I learned from you. Whatever success I have achieved, much of the credit goes to you. None of my friends have had experiences like those you provided to me. Most people would feel lucky to have lived a fraction of my life.

Thank you.

I love you.

Your son, Ralph Ertz, Jr.