Missing Him

A couple of weeks after my dad died, a friend of mine who had lost her mother a couple of years before that told me that the thing that left her with the most sadness since her mom's passing was thinking about the senses associated with her mom.  I didn't really understand what she meant at the time; I wasn't able to isolate what the worst or the most difficult part of all of it was because it all seemed so unbelievable and so horrible at that point.

I know now what she meant.  Thinking about my dad's hands, his legs, his wrinkles, his face, his voice, his laugh, his smile, his eyes - all of his physical presence - and how I'll never be able to be around them again makes me feel so sad, so lonely, and so very desperate.  

Sometimes I get a little glimpse of what I think for a split second is my dad, and in that moment I am like a drowning person struggling to get back to the surface of the water for air.  

About a month after my dad died, I was driving to work and saw a man that resembled him driving a car just like his.  I had to pull over to the side of the road and catch my breath.  

For months after he went on ahead, I woke up in the middle of the night and thought I'd heard him calling my name, just like he did so many nights when he was sick.  

As I sat crying on the night of the six-month anniversary of his death, I picked up my cell phone and impulsively texted "I love you" to the cell phone number by his name in my list of contacts.  A few minutes later, I got a response that read, "Who even is this?"  I felt like I'd been sucker punched.  Part of me wanted to text back, "Dad!! It's me! Are you ok?"  but I just kept sitting there crying, and after a few minutes another message flashed on the screen that said: "I think you have the wrong number."  

Several times when I've heard a group of people singing, I've thought I could pick out the sound of his voice singing above all the rest.  Each time that has happened, I let myself look into the crowd, just to make sure.

About six months ago, I posted the last part of the Behind the Scenes Story on this blog.  The song I chose to link to at the end of that entry was Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here."  My husband, who, incidentally, doesn't usually read this blog, invited me to take a spur-of-the-moment trip to Natchez, MS, with him a few days later.  While we were there, we asked around to find out where a cool bar was and ended up in a bizarre little place that was literally built into the side of the levee, a pub called Under The Hill.  

Only a few minutes after we walked in and sat down on our barstools, a guy started playing his acoustic guitar, and his first song was that exact Pink Floyd song.  Luckily, the darkness of the room hid the tears that rolled down my face as I sat there and listened in awe to the music.

This past summer, we had an accidental "iCloud" syncing of all of the Apple devices in my household, and all of our Contact Lists were blended together.  I didn't think too much about it until a few days later when my phone rang and I looked at the screen to see that it was showing up as "Dad" calling.  Evidently, my daughters had my husband's phone number listed under "Dad" in their Contact List, and so the iCloud sync had added that into my phone so that my husband's call showed up that way on my phone.  In the split second it took me to realize what had happened, part of my brain actually believed it was my dad calling me, and I felt my heart sink into my stomach when the reality of what was really happening dawned on me.

On the night before we left to take my older daughter to college for the first time, I was sitting outside on my deck and noticed that the wind was blowing through only some of the branches of one of the many trees in my backyard.  It was kind of eerie, and the words, "Hi, Dad," went through my mind.  About 15 seconds later, an owl hooted from in the woods behind my house.  I couldn't see it, but I exchanged a "Hello?" with the owl several times before the hooting and the isolated wind-blowing stopped.

A couple of weeks ago when my family was in New Orleans, I took my younger daughter and her friends to see the hotel where my parents stayed every February when they went for a business convention.  There, by the fountain in the lobby of the hotel, I thought for a split second that I saw my dad out of the corner of my eye, but, when I turned to look more closely, there was no one there.  

On the surface, it seems like getting a tiny glimpse or feeling a split-second connection to a loved one who has gone on ahead would be soothing, and maybe one day it will be for me - but now it mostly feels like salt (or something even worse) being poured in a wound. 

"Although their physical form is gone, you are not living your life without him or her. To live truly without them would be to never have known them. Instead, you continue to live with them infused in your heart, in your memories, in your spirit. You live with their love etched into your being. They will always, now and forever, be a part of you."

Road Trips

 My parents took my sisters and me on lots of road trips when we were growing up.  Both sets of our grandparents and the rest of our extended family lived in states other than where we lived, and it seemed like we piled into the station wagon and hit the road fairly often.

Like lots of families during that time period, we traveled on a pretty low budget.  We packed a cooler and a bag with things like colored pencils and paper and a deck of cards, and we were good to go.

We took lots of camping trips, did a good bit of sightseeing and touring, went to Disneyworld and several water parks, and made it to the beach on several occasions.  All of that blurs together as Good Time Family Fun in my Memory Bank.  There were, however, a few specific events during my childhood involving family road trips that I remember as standing out the most, things we did while traveling as a family that I think about again and again, memories that always bring a smile to my face.  I’m not even sure of the exact timeline of these.  All three happened as part of the travel my family was doing - they were side-shows, far removed from the main event; they were spontaneous; and they were unforgettable.

We lived in Albert Lea, Minnesota, when I was in kindergarten.  I loved that house for lots of reasons; I learned to ride a bike without training wheels in the front yard there, my younger sister came home from the hospital as a newborn to that house, and it had a cool laundry chute that went from the second floor to the laundry room in the basement.

One day, our parents were packing the car before we embarked on another road trip, and my sisters and I were in the den gathering up a few books and toys to take with us.  The TV show that was on came to an end, and the next thing that came on was a movie: “The Wizard of Oz.”  I had never seen it before, and I was mesmerized from the start by the tornado scene, the characters, the way it went from black-and-white to color, and the music.

About 30 minutes into the show, my parents completed their last-minute preparations for the trip.  I’m sure they were ahead of schedule for the time they had planned to depart on the trip; my dad hated to be late and went to great effort to make sure our family was on time wherever we went.  He came into the den and started his battle cry of “Load up!  Time to go!” but then saw us sitting on the floor, as he termed it, “glued to the TV.”  When he realized what we were watching, he and Mom sat on the couch behind us, and we watched the rest of the movie together, with Dad singing along to every song in the movie: from “We’re Off to See the Wizard” to “The Merry Old Land of Oz” and “If I Were King of the Forest.”  The movie and the music were great, and I’ll never forget how time seemed to stand still as my family sat there in the den that day, entranced, entertained, and together.

A few years after that, my family had moved to another state, and we were in the car again on a road trip.  I don’t remember where we started or where we ended up, but I do remember the best part of that trip:  Dad was driving along the highway while the rest of us looked out the window.  I don’t know who saw the little carnival in the hillside first, but I do remember the moment when all of had it seen it.  My sisters and I oohed and aahed at the Ferris wheel and the other rides we saw.  It looked like fun, but we were On the Road and On a Schedule.  Probably no one in the world was more surprised than we were at that exact moment in time when, without a word, Dad pulled onto the two-lane road at the foot of the hillside and started driving towards the carnival.  I remember thinking I was dreaming.  He pulled into the gravel parking lot, parked the car, and said, “Who’s up for some rides?”  Better than Christmas!

 When I was a pre-teen and even into my high school years, my family celebrated New Year’s Eve by staying overnight in a Holidome about 100 miles from where we lived.  My sisters and I each got to invite a friend, and, once we got to there, our parents pretty much unleashed us in the open space inside the hotel.  We ran in the halls, jumped on the beds, rode up and down the elevators, went into the sauna room, ordered room service, watched music videos on MTV (which we weren’t allowed to have at home), and swam in the indoor pool.  Just enough freedom, lots of fun, excellent people-watching (one year we watched a woman swim laps in the pool for hours in a shower cap) – it was perfect.

I’m not sure if there is a specific lesson from or a point to looking back at memories like these, other than just remembering and thinking about how much fun we had together as a family.  Maybe there’s a little bit of a “Take time to smell the roses” lesson in there, and that we certainly did.  We definitely appreciated each opportunity, each day, and each other along the way, and for that, as well as the memories that time will not allow us to forget, I will be forever grateful.

I remember riding in the backseat of the car with my sisters, barreling

down the highway on family trips, listening to Dad sing this song.

Here in My Heart

The measure of every other grief

Is held to my own:

Is it longer, heavier, more powerful than mine?

I feel like I'm alone.

Those who have told me that time will heal

I know to be far off-base

I, in fact, don’t want to be healed           

For fear of having memories replaced.

It doesn’t hurt to hear his name

It doesn’t bring him or his death to mind

The thought of him already is always there for me

Aching if it seems he’s being left behind.

As much as I know part of him lives now with me,

I also know that part of me died with him, too.

I’ve lost my umbrella, and I’m not sure how else to weather the storm

Or how to walk down this road anew.

I want to call his phone and hear his voice

Leave him a message and know he’ll reply           

I want to get a scribbled note from him

I want to see the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes.

I want to hear him singing

Making up the words he doesn’t know,

To tell him something I’m dreaming about doing,

And to hear his funny expressions like "Gung-ho."

I want to know that he still sees the good stuff,

The kids happy and doing well as they grow.

His impact, his presence is with us always;

This I want to be sure he knows.

I’m not sure how to carry this pain

That cuts me like a knife.

I really just want to sit and cry,

But I have to go on with life.

I want to tell him thanks

For being my lifelong teacher and fan

And that I’m so impressed and in awe

Of how he went out like a man.

I keep remembering seeing his light

And it seemed like it was fading away

I wanted so badly to go after him

And to beg for him to stay.

But after all he has done for me

It was time for us to part

I had to let him go on ahead

But I’ll always keep him Here in my heart.