My In-Laws Tried to Kick My Dad out of Our Wedding Because He Was a Sanitation Worker – but His Speech Silenced the Whole Room

My dad left for work at 4:30 every morning. I’d hear the door close softly, feel the apartment shift as he tried not to wake me.

By the time I got up for school, he’d already been working for hours.

He came home smelling of metal, exhaust, sweat, and something I couldn’t name but always recognized.

His hands were calloused. His back hurt most nights. Some evenings he barely spoke because exhaustion had drained every extra word out of him.

But he never missed a parent-teacher conference.

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