I remember nearly every word of one of the last conversations I had with my father before he left this world.

Although the mothers come first because of the nine-month connection, fathers are very important too.

It is very important to have a relationship with your father, whether you are a boy or girl. It seems to be a tradition that the man should give guidance to the boys and not the girls and vice versa for the mother, but that is not true.

We fail to realize that girls should know about boys before they get involved with them.

With girls, the first man in their lives is their fathers. From her father she will learn many things at an early age.

She will learn that her father is a gentleman, a protector and hero, her knight in shining armor and a breadwinner. She finds out that he is a gentleman by the way he treats her mother — opening doors, pulling chairs out and letting her go into doors first. She will learn that he is a protector and hero because he always looks out for the family safety. She’ll notice that when the family is threatened by outsiders, her father takes charge. She will notice that he is her knight in shining armor when she falls off the bike while learning to ride it for the first time, and he runs over and picks her up from off the ground and wipes her tears away. She will know that he is a breadwinner when he maintains a job and financially keeps the household in order. She will also learn how a man is to respect his woman by the way he respects her mom.

From her father, she will learn that she is special when he gives her the best party of her life on her 16th birthday.

Although I speak of a girl-father relationship, we must remember that the father must portray life to all his children, boys or girls.

We must remember that just as we have a relationship with our earthly father, we also must have one with our heavenly Father. Our heavenly Father has an advantage over our earthly father because it is said in his word that he sits high and looks low.

With that in mind, when we have an earthly father that is covered by the heavenly Father, we can’t lose as children — period.

Keep in mind that our relationship must not stop with the father, but with the Father.

Beverly Gibson is a Ferriday resident.