This is my first birthday without my father.
Dad passed away September 19 after a long struggle with esophageal cancer and its assorted complications.
I am enormously thankful that my mother is still alive, as it has been so very difficult facing each day knowing my dad is not a phone call or a few steps away. Since 2008, I had the honor of living with my folks and assisting them in any way that I could.
Dad and I became very close during that time. It had not always been so. For most of my life, I butted heads with him over nearly every decision I made or thought that I had.
We were very much alike, you see. However, in many ways, we were very different. This, of course, led to some misunderstandings, or more aptly, standoffs akin to “High Noon.”
I really started loving my dad about 12 years ago. I mean, really knowing that I loved him, not in that way that a child seems obligated to love a parent, but—to borrow a phrase I often heard at church—in a “know that you know that you know” way.
The reasons are complicated and are better written about when I am able to step back a bit more and observe them, but there it is.
In the meantime, I am at a loss this birthday. Christmas likewise will be difficult. I have trouble dealing with my grief on many days.
Today is one of them.
