I could say that I lost my dad, but that makes it sounds like I misplaced him, like a hat that sometime I might be able to find again. That isn't true.
If your favorite person in the world has not yet died, let me share this - it shatters every single thing that you knew to be true. There is a hole in your heart that can't, won't, shouldn't be filled or fixed. You are changed. They are dead, and you must keep living. There is nothing to which it can be compared. It's a cruel joke.
It's been a whole year, and as I write this, I'm crying. I'm crying because I miss him, I'm crying because I'm sad that he doesn't get to live in this world and see the wonderful things that he loved so much, I'm crying because to be honest, I feel sorry for myself. I want my dad. When things have been hard this past year, that has been my cry, my plea.
I know that life is not fair and all that other garbage, but I can't comprehend how someone so completely good and humble and generous and thoughtful is gone so soon in his life when there are horrible people that live only for themselves and complain constantly that keep on living. How does that work? I don't want to hear any bullshit about God's plan or it was just his time. That's what you say to people when you don't know what to say and I don't want to hear it. That'll be a whole different post - "How to NOT be a wank when someone you love's favorite person dies."
I understand that some people choose to celebrate their loved one's "heaveniversary" and if that helps them, good. Do it. Rock that shit. We all have our own grief path. Mine does not include celebrating this horrible day. Instead I have finally unpacked/opened the urn that I had made by a family friend. Put dad in there. I lit a honeysuckle candle that he got me because we both loved honeysuckle. And I'll just cry a little more.
When I was little, I remember reading The Tenth Good Thing About Barney. While my dad had many, many amazing qualities, I'm just going to list ten today. Ten memories or quirks or whatever you'd like to call them.
10. He was super freaking smart, especially if it was geography, history, or science. Anything outdoors, he was your guy. If you were lost in the woods, you'd want him with you.
9. He use to rub his feet together. The rest of him would be completely still - reading or watching tv or talking to you, but it's like his feet couldn't stay still.
8. He liked breakfast. He was amazed (and disturbed) when he learned I hadn't been to an Ihop and he took me immediately. Breakfast anytime of the day.
7. He volunteered - his time, his money, whatever. He was on boards, he judged and coached Science Olympiad, National History Day, OM, my softball team. Everything.
6. He would drop everything for a good board game or puzzle. The number of times that he and I played Clue, Payday, Monopoly, Sorry, Skip-Bo were endless. It didn't matter how busy he was or what he had to do to prep for school the next day, we played.
5. He taught me to swim and to float and that ice cream was the reward after a day at the beach. The White Duck was never a convenience store to me, I always just thought of it as an ice cream shop. That's where we got ice cream. Never occurred to me to turn away from the ice cream counter to see a whole store behind me.
4. He liked music. He liked to talk about it, listen to it, he liked old stuff but loved when I would introduce him to newer things. He liked Green Day. Florence and the Machine. Arcade Fire. Eisley. I learned about the Beatles from him, and every other older band. He loved Traveling Wilburys.
3. He babied me until he died. There's no other way to say it. I don't mean that I was spoiled or didn't work for things, but I had his support. And when I was sick, he made me either chicken and rice (his speciality) or noodle soup. He cut my pizza into little squares, because that's how I liked it. I don't think he said no to me much, but I didn't ask for things like money - I usually wanted his time.
2. He liked to garden. Together we planted tulips and daffodils, and I planted glads, because I liked to pronounce them "glad-e-o-lees". So he bought me a bag of bulbs to plant, just so I could say the name. His garden was amazing. Wildflowers, poppies, lillies, foxgloves, peonies, lilacs, hyacinth, honeysuckle, lavender - everything. If I wasn't in the garden with him, I was talking to him from the deck or balcony while he was out there.
1. He was my absolute best friend. He knew all my secrets. There were lots of drives he and I did together - to college, to Gram's, to Phoenix - we could sit in silence and it was comfortable, but we also talked a lot. A LOT.
So. One year ago today my dad died. His story doesn't end there, though. I refuse to let it.
