Spending time with my dad

If you've been following along, you're probably wondering how I'm spending time with him. Don't worry, he's still planted firmly beneath the ground in Chardon, Ohio near his little brother and his grandparents.

Salty (my older sister) got married in November, and while she was physically getting ready for the wedding, she also spent a lot of time mentally preparing herself for a new life with less sad in it. This, I think, was born out of mentally preparing for a day when your dad is supposed to be the second-most important man at the party. There's that whole walking down the aisle thing, and the speeches, and the dance, blah blah. It's almost like our wedding traditions are custom made to make people without dads feel abnormal. Salty managed it with more grace and patience than I have ever seen anyone show, and that's pretty strange, considering for much of my life she was been the most high-strung, irritable and impatient person I know.

You'd be high-strung and irritable and impatient too if you were so busy being busy that you couldn't grieve for your dad.  She changed things by giving herself time to process it all.

Anyway, if you've been following along, you know this moving thing, this leaving J thing, this alone thing...you know that it's all been kind of hard on me emotionally. A couple of weeks ago, Salty recommended that I take some time for myself to grieve, since I've never really done that.  For me that's translated into talking to him whenever I think about him.  I lie in bed at night and tell him how I feel.  Sometimes I cry and yell at him about how angry I am that he died when I was so little and missed most of my life.  I ask him questions and think hard about the answers - Weren't we good enough to live for? Wasn't there anything we could have done? Did I love him enough? If I did, then why didn't he love me enough to stick around? I talk to him on the Subway platform and tell him how I wish he was alive to be proud of me for making the changes I have.  I don't care if people stare...it feels good.  I need it.