It’s not easy having the same name as your dad.

To be honest, the Schinkers are not known for their creativity in naming the boys. I’m John, and my brother is George. Our father is John, and he had a brother named George. Their father was George, and he had a brother named John. Their father was George, and he had a brother named… Michael.

But my whole life, I’ve been compared to my dad. To little boys, dads are superheroes. They’re impossibly strong. They’re giants. They can do anything, make anything, fix anything. There are no problems dads can’t solve. When I was little, I’d walk around the house in his giant shoes and wonder how my feet could ever be big enough to fill them.

And having his name, I thought I had to be him. He was a member of the Order of the Arrow, a national boy scout honor society. He occasionally told tales of scouting trips and misadventures. He could make fires and use knives and tie knots. So I joined cub scouts. But every camper has a “camp name,” and there’s a reason my camp name is “Holiday Inn.”

Football was a big part of his life. He played on Fitch’s 1963 championship team, and was ultimately inducted with that team to the Austintown Fitch athletic hall of fame. He coached for many years at St. Christine’s, and later Boardman Little Spartans. One year, he got together with coaches John Christy and Dick Fitch to watch new year’s bowl games, and they realized they had coached at least one player in every major game. And I’m sure they were yelling at the screen when one of them missed a tackle or blew a blocking assignment.

So when the flyer came home in 4th grade, I signed up to play football. And I played in 4th grade, 5th grade, 6th grade, 7th grade. But I’m not a football player. I’m slow and clumsy and not nearly strong enough or aggressive enough to be any good. And he knew that long before I did. When I finally worked up the courage to tell him I didn’t want to play in 8th grade, he wasn’t disappointed. He wasn’t upset. Honestly, I think he was just as relieved as I was. He told me to find something else that I’m interested in, and do that. The important thing was to be involved in something that I cared about. He didn’t want me to be him. He wanted me to be me.

He often talked about growing up poor in a house with seven kids. They didn’t even have indoor plumbing when he was young. To make ends meet, they had a giant vegetable garden that consumed the entire yard. When he was in high school, he and his twin brother Bill were the only ones left at home, but they still had to take care of this giant garden. So when their father was away for work one spring, they planted grass. And every day, they fertilized it and watered it, and by the time he came home, the garden was a lawn. Grandpa was very upset, but he never said a word about it.

So Dad grows up, gets married, buys a house, and puts in… a 2,000 square foot garden. And our job growing up was to weed, and mulch, and harvest, and help with picking beans, canning corn and tomatoes, digging potatoes and taking care of this garden that was at least four times as big as it needed to be. And I swore I was never going to have a garden.

You all know where this is growing. Not only is there a vegetable garden in my yard, but there are also more than 60 tropical plants that have specific humidity, light, and water requirements. Sometimes people are so passionate about their interests that they’re contagious.

Last week, we were over at the house, and Dad made spaghetti. It was just the five of us, Dad and mom, George, Dynele, and me. It hasn’t been just the five of us in years. He made a meat sauce, and he was very proud of it.

Now, let’s be clear. Mom is the Italian. When they first met, Dad took her home for dinner, and Grandma made spaghetti. He raved about her sauce. It’s the best sauce in the world. You won’t believe how wonderful her tomato sauce is. So Grandma makes dinner, and Mom eats politely. And Dad’s raving about how nobody can make spaghetti sauce like his mother. So Mom asks Grandma what her secret is. “Oh, Dear, that’s Ragu. You just pour it out of the jar and heat it up.”

So Dad made spaghetti and meat sauce last week. And everyone had some. It was… fine. But Dad? Dad loved it. And he loved making and sharing it, and it didn’t matter that he didn’t know when it had too much basil or not enough. It wasn’t perfect, but he was proud of it, and that’s all that really mattered.

When my sister Dynele was born, we moved into a 50-year-old house that needed some work. But Dad didn’t have the money to hire contractors, and he was very particular about how things were done. So he did most of it himself. He replaced the old oil burner and radiators with a new heating system. He remodeled the second floor apartment into bedrooms for us. He tore off the kitchen and dining room and rebuilt them from the ground up. He reconfigured the first floor and created a new master suite. He taught himself to be a carpenter, a plumber, an electrician, a roofer, a painter, and a mason.

And while he was teaching himself, he was also teaching us. We learned how to build walls and install windows and sweat copper pipes. We learned about electrical circuits and vapor barriers and drain vents. When I was four, Dad put a new roof on the house. He was working on the ridge, 25 feet off the ground, when three year old George came walking across the roof. “Whatcha doin’, Dad?” He had climbed the ladder and walked across the roof because he wanted to help. We didn’t need Youtube to show us how to do things, because we had Dad.

But he wasn’t fast. We moved in the week Dynele was born, and mom finally set the ultimatum that the house had to be done before her wedding. And he made it, with a couple weeks to spare.

Dad loved his family. He adored his grandchildren, and would do anything for them. If there was a game or a concert or a play or school event, he was there. He cherished their visits, and he was the most happy when all of his children were together. Anytime someone needed help, he was right there. Need help building a deck? He’s right there, tools in hand. Need help moving a kid to college? Here he comes in his truck, ready to go. He was so proud of all of his children and grandchildren and he cherished the time he spent with them.

I didn’t turn out to be a boy scout. And I’m definitely not a football player. But Dad gave me the freedom to become the person that I needed to be. And I ended up just like him.

I love you, Dad. I’ll try to take care of your name.