A file photo of Datuk Dr Zainal Aznam Yusof, a father of three, dated Nov 11, 2009, less than two years before his passing on April 30, 2011, aged 66.
One day while looking through our father’s stacks of paper, our mother came across a very interesting and touching article that our father had written about a father’s love for his daughter.
Mother handed the piece to us to read. It was a piece of writing that our father never shared with us before. As we were reading it, we felt it unveiling a side of our father that we never knew.
In it, our father expressed the importance of savouring every moment you have with your daughter, as something so delicate and fragile can pass quickly.
It was as though the economist in him could see how the bond between fathers and daughters would reach the inevitable one day.
His words touched us immensely. Hopefully, we can share them with our children one day. We and our family are honoured to share this beautiful piece here with you, in remembrance of our father who passed away two years ago, on April 30, 2011. More than that, we hope it, too, will touch the hearts of fathers and daughters out there.
Shazalina and Juliana,
Daughters of the late Datuk Dr Zainal Aznam Yusof
An article on daughters
There is nothing to compare the feeling of having one’s daughter on one’s knees sitting outside on the swing, late in the evening, with the sun about to set, a cool breeze blowing over the garden lawn, and just looking at her smiling face and swirling hair, singing a simple song – a delightful bond between a father and a daughter.
It’s a scene, I am sure, that is repeated again and again as long as there are fathers and daughters, a garden, a swing, the wind, and as long as there is a setting sun.
But this bond can only be very fleeting, like all fine and beautiful things, and fragile, and is only meant to last as long as there is a memory to remind fathers and daughters that once upon a time there was this tender moment in our lives. Such moments should be savoured for all their sweetness and the promises that they can bring.
The passage of time may dim this memory, and the promises of a full, healthy and long life may never be fulfilled as age and experience can wither the spirit, and life becomes listless and deadening.
Daughters will fall in love and leave and never to return again, and as he succumbs to the withering forces of life, levelling him to dust, he will search and search for that faint memory of that timeless evening when he had a delightful daughter on his knees for a short moment, and when there was hope to sustain him on the final and painful phase of what remained of his life.
Datuk Dr Zainal Aznam Yusof
Oct 15, 1992
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