It’s the first Father’s Day without you. In two days, it will have been a month since the morning I saw you take your last breath. Since I last told you I loved you. I don’t even know if you heard me.
You had been asleep for days.
Cancer sucks. I know you wouldn’t want me to phrase it that way, but it does.
I don’t think I have fully processed what it will mean to not see you again on this side of eternity. I don’t think I understand yet how hard it will be not to hug you again, or see you smile, or hear you call Mom, “Baby.” I can’t quite grasp that I will walk in the house and not hear the TV going at full volume because you aren’t wearing your hearing aids. I won’t sit out on the front porch with you in silence watching the birds you feed in your yard.
I want to see you wearing one of those Hawaiian shirts you loved so much. Even if I thought they were ugly, (sorry Dad!).
Veteran’s Day is going to be hard this year. I know, it’s a random thought since it’s still so many months away. But, it was a special time in the school year for me.
I loved having you Zoom into my classroom and telling my first graders about serving your country. I loved watching them ask you questions and hearing your responses. It was like I got to see a different side of you. It was a little peek into your life at 18, before mom, before us kids. Veteran’s Day will be hard because I will not get to share you with my classroom. The kids always loved it. So, did I. I think you did, too.
After you died, I realized I didn’t have any old voicemails from you. I checked. I must have deleted them before we knew the end was coming. I just want one saying, “It’s your daddy. Just calling to say, ‘I love you.’” But, I must have cleared them foolishly thinking that you would always be here with me.
Cancer sucks.
I know I said it again, and I know the word “sucks” is unladylike.
(See, I really did listen to you.)
I keep thinking about how much you will miss... graduations, weddings, births, quiet mornings, Tuesday evenings, and Thanksgiving chaos. You’d remind me that you are in a better place. You told me several times that you were at peace. That it was okay. That somebody had to be the first one to die in the family.
So, I guess it’s not really all that you will miss, but all that I will miss out on…The big moments and the little moments when I will miss you not being there.
But, I do have your old sermons.
Handwritten sermons by you. Words you poured over, prayed over. Now they have become a treasured, precious possession. Like finding a recipe box written in a grandmother’s shaky scrawl. And, just like a recipe gives instructions on how to make something wonderful, your sermons are instructions on how to make a life that is also wonderful.
So, in a way, I can still hear your voice. Each time I type them into my computer, I hear you tell me things you would want me to know. I know what you would say to me if you were still here. I tell myself this treasure should be enough. Lots of other people would love to have over a thousand life lessons from their dad to carry them through all the hard times to come. I know I’m lucky, or blessed as you would phrase it.
But, I’m greedy. The written words, the pictures, the memories- they’re not quite enough.
I just want one more hug.