I have no idea why I started to think about it – maybe it was the hearse that I passed on the way to school; but I was thinking about him before that. I can’t stop thinking about my Dad this morning and all it’s doing is making me sad and making me want to curl up in bed with some snacks, some movies, and pretend that the world doesn’t exist. But instead, I’m at my desk trying to focus on something other than the night my Dad died.
I keep thinking – no, rehashing – what happened that night in my head. The phone call, how it felt to hear that the doctor wanted to talk to me and later fumbling with my pants and shoes and running out the door to try to get to him before it was too late. Hearing the nurses say they lost his pulse, watching them do CPR on him – something no one should have to watch because that was way more traumatic then it appears to be on TV. And telling them to stop. Standing in the hallway outside of his room, telling my best friend that he was gone and hearing the silence, and then shock in his voice because he really didn’t think that was why I was calling him and no one expected my Dad to die. And then seeing my Dad at the funeral home, in the casket and feeling like it just didn’t look like him – until I took a few steps back and saw his profile and sat in a chair, just looking at him and trying to be more aware of the fact that he was gone. And now, feeling that he’s just gone. He’s not here; as much as I want him to be and as much I try not to think about it, I don’t feel like he’s with us. Maybe it’s too soon for him to be, or maybe he’s just too busy with everyone else that he’s now reunited with. But he’s not here. He was the good parent, the parent that I trusted and could rely on and now that he’s gone, it just feels……..empty. I don’t feel empty, neither does my life; but something just does. There’s this part of me that will never be the same; I was who I was before because of him (and my Mom, too) and now I’m someone else because they are both gone. I know that he didn’t want to be here anymore. He was so tired and probably hated being alone – with my Mom and his best friend gone, he had no one left I guess. And I understand that, at least as best as I can even on a day like today when I would give just about anything to hear his voice again.
And as I sit here at my desk, in my office, at a job that I hoped made him proud, I fight back the tears as I remember sitting in his chair with him watching tv when I was a little kid. A little kid who would cram themselves onto his lap to cuddle for even a little while; eventually I got too big and I got kicked off of that lap. But then I sat next to him and often leaned my head on his lap. He was always my favorite and now, he’s just gone. For whatever the reason, today is one of those days that I would give anything to see his smile again and to hear his voice and to sit in that chair with him again. That old, ratty black leather chair that squeaked when it reclined and that we shared many nights watching whatever it was that he watched at that time; I remember him sitting there while I watched the Muppet Show on summer nights before bedtime, but I am pretty sure he didn’t watch that willingly.
Today I am 40-something year old orphan, crying in her office, who really really misses her Dad.
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