Me, My Dad

I miss My Dad.

Yesterday was the first Father's Day without his presence in My life. I have books I want to share with him, anecdotes to tell, baseball happenings to analyze and debate, successes and failures to discuss and just things I want to bounce between Us. Only he's gone and I have only Myself.

That's probably the hardest part: Taking on My own, singular identity. As much as the process is started for an adult to emerge, it really isn't complete until the parent is gone, for only then do you know what's yours, what was his and what was inseparable. It's been a few months now and I'm only now starting to understand who I am...now.

My son mentions his Grandpa a lot. We talk about him, or mainly, We talk about his death. I know he's trying to come to terms with having Grandpa there--and then not. He probably also senses that I haven't come to terms with it either, but that I'm willing to share with him what little I understand so as to help him along the way.

Maybe I'm reading too much into it and he's only asking because he wants to make sure I know he hasn't forgotten. But I doubt it. From the topics We share to the things We do to the jokes We tell, Grandpa is there. Even if My son, in his rumbly-tumbly childhood world, forgets his Grandpa, he'll be there. And if in some dim future I lose the ability to remember, it won't make a difference, for in Me there is and always will be, My Dad.

Even so, I miss him.


The Jenius Has Spoken.