Once upon a time, my father caught a fish...

It was a trophy-sized marlin. We repeatedly heard the story about the all-day fight and catch, a theft from the cooler, the feds chasing it down after the stolen fish was entered in another tournament, and the subsequent return to my dad. My sister still has this family heirloom which is meaningful in large part because of the tale.

Anyway, my dad would make semi-jokes (with earshot of my mother) about how that day was "the greatest day of his life." My mom would make some crack about his wedding day to which his response would be a delayed, "Yeah, maybe the marlin was second." That pause lead me to believe that he really did think that his Marlin Day was better than his Wedding Day.

So, I was thinking about my favorite days...leaving out, in the spirit of my father, the obvious wedding day and birthdays of the children. In no particular order:

My university had an eagle aviary that houses the mascot. I remember one day my senior year in college in which the coolest girl I knew (and eventually married) talked me into skipping class on a beautiful spring day, laying down on the grass by the eagle's cage and discussing hopes and dreams while staring at the sky. We missed more than one class and lunch and were there most of the afternoon.

One morning, I had breakfast in Cinderella's Castle at Disneyworld's Magic Kingdom with my wife and daughters. It was a tough ticket to get (involving early morning phone calls with my wife having two phones trying to get through like six months in advance), but well worth it. We got into the park early. Princesses and princes came to our table to check on us, the view was cool, and the Fairy Godmother waited at the bottom of the stairs granting wishes like nobody's business. My sister showed up and we all went to Mickey's Not-So-Scary Halloween party in which the Disney characters all dressed up in costumes and gave out candy. That day ended with fireworks and a parade. It might have been one of the best days from sunrise to sundown I've ever had.

Auburn 38, Florida 35. 1993. I was there in the drizzle. I still watch the video highlights and smile, trying to figure out how my beloved 21 point underdog Tigers pulled that one out on a last minute field goal.

There was a day at seminary when it was so obvious that my professor, Tom Constable, was so Spirit-led teaching God's Word that when the buzzer went off signifying the end of the hour, it "woke" him. No one moved out of their seat for 15 minutes. I could hardly breathe all day.

On a trip to visit my sister when she lived in New York City, we went to see the Statue of Liberty, ate lunch at the 2nd Avenue Deli and finished up with The Lion King on Broadway (after the fates smiled on us with last minute tickets). Of course, every day in New York City is a great day to me.

There were other days that had stand-out moments in them, like the day we got Buford, or moved into our home, or the last day of class at seminary, or going to a Stanley Cup final, but those were great days from beginning to end...