Sporks and Things

Dear Dad, Ten years is a long time. In those first few months, your absence felt like a lost limb. How could I possibly go on with life as normal without you? It's really hard for me now - ten years later - to be nice to a 23 year-old me dealing with the loss of you. She was selfish, unkind, thoughtless. The worst version of someone going through grief, even when I should have been expecting you to die. But I was so unwilling to reckon with anything that would have stopped me from carrying on as I had been, blissfully and painfully making my own way, finally not penned-in by other people's choices... Because of all that delusion, when you died it felt like a surprise, even though it shouldn't have. I knew you were dying. I had known for years. I had let myself - made myself - forget. And so it somehow all felt fresh. When you died I wasn't able to do any of the practical things I should have. I couldn't put together a funeral. Couldn't begin to approach the finances. Mom and her family took care of all of it, and I let it happen around me. Sleeping and crying and acting like I didn't know this was coming, because it all just hurt too much. How lucky am I, to have had these people to take care of me when I missed you so much it made me inert?   I hate that version of me. Hate her. The selfishness and self-pity and total inability to get the important shit done. Making her problems other people's problems. The fact that others did my job for me and that I was a petty, cruel, and self-involved monster in return. And I languished in that state for the better part of a year. It makes me cower in shame to this day. I think, if you were here now, you would tell me to cut 23 year-old me some slack. I think you would tell me to be kind to this past version of myself. But I can't be sure. Later, things got easier. Your loss became a scab, a healing thing that could be left alone to sort itself out. But I kept picking at it because I missed you. I got on with the work of building that self-determined life of my own. It's been a mixed - but mostly positive! - bag I've pulled together without you, Dad. Ten years is a long time, and in those years I've built a career that I know has value. It's not that I always like it, or that it's my passion, or that I think it's "important" - but my job can and often does help people.

I remember you hating your job... all of the time. The blue collar work you did never inspired you, and you never got paid enough to feel like that was an okay compromise. Knowing that - and knowing that Mom got paid very little helping people help themselves and was content because of it - I picked a path that I knew would bring me some level of... moral satisfaction. It's not to say that my job is better than anyone else's (or without it's deeply flawed, systemic issues that I contribute to), but it makes me happier to feel like I'm helping people. The fact that I've stumbled into a successful career because of it is an equal combination of happy accident and working very, very hard. I think you'd like that for me.

But I can't be sure.

I also have amazing friends. I remember at the end, you didn't have many people around. I don't know why, Dad, cause while you were a challenging person you were also so worthwhile - funny and insightful and ready to shoot the shit. But when you died, you were alone. And that haunts me. Ten years is a long time, and I moved a year before you died. The friends I've made here are just... the best. We give each other shit, but when life gets hard, we're there. I still remember when Cheri died, and an impromptu get-together was held at my apartment, my friends showing up 'for no reason' with food, drink and distractions to just be there after an unexpected tragedy. That's something that 'just happened' around me, because my friends knew I needed them and I  couldn't ask. What excellent humans. And that's not all. I remember when I would leave the small holiday events Cheri, you and I would have early, moving on to Mom's family outings to hang with my cousins. You both were always so amazingly gracious in those moments, knowing how much those people mattered to me. They still do. It's rare when your family by blood becomes your family by choice, but god damn these are good people who rally around one another in moments of crisis. What a gift. I think you'd be happy to hear that I have such strong support systems, excited to know that I'm a part of friend groups that love each other through work and effort and caring. But I can't be sure. Dad, missing you is hard. Missing who I might have been with you in my life is worse. My life is good. Not perfect, often lonely, but so, so good. I still wish I lived in the version of the universe that had you around for ten more years. I want it for selfish reasons. I wish that you had been around when I had been at my lowest, because to this day you're the only person who made me think I'm great just for being myself. I wish you had been around when I was at my best, because I think you could have forced me to celebrate my successes when I've been reluctant to. I also wish you had been around to tell me to take more risks, because while my life is secure and happy, it might have been better if I had someone in my corner just daring me to try for more. But I can't be sure. Because you're not here. You've been gone for a decade. I miss you so, so much. You've been gone so long that I've started to miss the idea of who you would have been. What an unfair thing, for both of us. But still. It is what it is.