Hey Dad,
It’s been three years since we last held hands, last watched James Bond and HGTV, and last joked about how much we could sell your pills for on the black market. (#regrets)
Three years ago, I spent the better part of three months driving back and forth from small airport to small town (in big, big snow), wondering what “after” would look like. How could we possibly have an “after” when our hero was leaving us? I would watch you watch the snow falling through the window, your blue eyes impossibly bright in the weak March sunlight, and know that the quietude and grace of your hospice care would- eventually- end, and that would be my after. My “after” would always be tinged with grief, anger, and desperate love.
And it has been.
But it also hasn’t.
Because we continued to “after.” Because, while alive, you worked dang hard to make sure that we would.
There’s not a day that goes by where my breath doesn’t catch in my lungs for a thought, a lyric, a shirt, a scene, or an almost-phone call. But then there are the toasts, the pennies, the dreams, and the gestures made in your honor.
When things happen, it’s with the knowledge that you would’ve loved/hated them.
Like that time when Suzy, then a 3-year old flower girl, handed out too many petals early on at Em and Dan’s wedding…and then went back to retrieve and re-use them for the front rows, I could pretty much hear your laughter. (It was drowned out by everyone else in attendance, but I know I heard you, too.)
Or…the state of politics right now. (Oh, you would’ve been apoplectic. But don’t worry, Dad, we’re on it.)
I think you’d be proud of us. We’ve all of us- Mom, my sisters, and those guys we paired off with- done some pretty cool things in the past three years. (And Dad, you wouldn’t believe this house. It pretty much looks like a house now! There’s a back door that slides open and we grill out and you can smell the Colombian chicken place down the block even more easily. Your personal idea of a Very Good Choice.)
The kids are so big. I know you know this. I know how proud you are of Nora reading like a middle schooler, and Susannah making everyone everywhere feel welcome, and Jasper telling these stoic-faced little jokes like some sort of man person. I know you marvel at them from afar. I just wish I could see your face as you do.
You’re with us every time we cook food. All food. You loved Irish cuisine and Armenian dishes of Mom’s and things at our deli and a category that- let’s just go ahead and call it- Summer Food. You couldn’t resist ice cream and treats “for the kids.”
So you didn’t resist it.
And now, neither do we. (Today the kids got doughnuts. “For you.” You’re welcome, Dad.)
No one’s played “Lido Shuffle” for me in a while. Maybe you don’t think I need randomly played radio signs as much as I did three years ago- and maybe you’re right.
Because my “after” has shown me that you’re not a Boz Scaggs lyric. Or a flannel shirt. Or a leather keychain or an enameled shamrock pin or a collection of Mystery Science Theatre: 3000 DVDs. You’re not in any one thing, and the loss or possession of any object doesn’t change how wonderfully you’re still loved and honored every single day by the family you created and the family of your heart.
That doesn’t necessarily bring you any closer, however, on the days where the warmth of ethereal remembrance isn’t worth the paper it was written on. Three years in, and the rest of my life to go.
But, like other facts, emotions don’t change this one a heck of a lot. I know this. You knew this. You taught me this.
And I’m pretty sure that’s what “buck up” really means.
(Yeah. I’m still listening to you, Dad.)
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