from September 2, 2008 (six months since my dad died)
People talk about grief having stages. I just went through a new one recently: I will never see my Dad again. When Dad died, I had that instantaneous “I miss Dad” that a person feels when someone that they love leaves; in April, it hit me: “He’s not ever coming back; this missing him is – forever.” Or, at least, until I die.
Three of the sensations I try hard to keep in mind and therefore frequently recall to memory are: 1) the feeling of holding Dad’s lily-soft hand; 2) how it felt to kiss him on his ruddy, stubbly cheek; 3) the texture of his snowy white hair (I patted him on the head a lot in the hospital). Dear God, let these memories linger.
He is still with me; he’s still by my side as I walked out of the house my grandfather was born in on Cape Breton Island in 2004 and cried, “This was the best experience of my life,” and he will be by my side when I walk down the aisle.
One of my Dad’s favorite things to say when people who came to visit where getting ready to leave was, “You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here.” In the hospital, as my father’s inhales became shorter and his exhales longer, my brother Steve assured him that we would take good care of mom and it was okay for him to let go. Just before he died, Stephen kissed him on the forehead and said, “Go home, because you can’t stay here.”
When Stephen returned from the hospital hours later, we were all gathered at my parent’s house for an impromptu “Irish wake”; friends and family had dropped by and were crying, reminiscing, and laughing with us (it is hard to reminisce about dad and not laugh). Steve came in the front door, and said, “I thought of a joke for the last chapter of Mike’s book (see eulogy above): Dad goes to heaven; he sees Jesus at the pearly gates and gives him a big hug.
Dad asks Jesus, “Do you know how to save an Irishman from drowning?”
Jesus says, “I just did.”
Please continue to pray for me as I get used to the world without my Dad in it.
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