I’ve been thinking about this question most of the day, and I realized pretty quickly that my answer isn’t simple. I was fortunate—and complicated enough—to have both a dad and a father, and pretending that only one of them mattered wouldn’t be honest.
My dad was Charles Fulton. I lived with him through most of my teenage years, and those years matter. He taught me many of the things people usually picture learning from a dad—the practical, everyday lessons that come from shared life rather than formal instruction. How to do things. How to try. How to engage the world. He modeled presence. He was there. And that kind of influence seeps in quietly and stays with you.
My father was Marvin DeBolt, and his influence looked very different. Marvin wasn’t a “rah-rah” encourager. He was more likely to tell you what to do—and then tell you when you were doing it wrong—than to tell you when you were doing it right. At the time, that could be frustrating. Looking back, I see how it shaped me. It set an internal standard. It built resilience. It taught me that faithfulness and responsibility mattered, whether or not anyone applauded.
But Marvin also gave me something else that I value deeply: a way of seeing the world. My love of history and the news came from him. So did my appreciation for cinema, classic television, jazz, and film noir. Many of the things that still capture my imagination—the stories I love, the tone I’m drawn to, the idea that the past matters and that art can carry truth—trace back to time spent under his influence. He didn’t just shape my spine; he shaped my lens.
And woven through all of that is the steady, often unsung influence of my mother, who gave me compassion, creativity, kindness, a love for the Lord, and an artistic streak that balances out harder edges. If Charles taught me how to live and Marvin taught me how to pay attention, my mother taught me how to love.
So when I’m asked to describe a man who positively impacted my life, the most honest answer is this: I am a cross between two men, shaped by presence on one side and expectation on the other, and tempered by a remarkable woman who taught me grace.
I didn’t become a mirror of either man.
I became a mosaic of all three.
And for that, I’m deeply grateful.
Copyright © 2025 Doug DeBolt.
