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Happy 71st birthday, Dad

Hey Dad,

Happy 71st birthday. Yes, I know I'm writing this five days early, but it's what works best with my blogging schedule--call that selfish if you want, but it is what it is. And, you know, this year your birthday is on Thanksgiving and I think I won't be up for writing to you that day.

So, here we go.

Life has been complicated since you passed away in March. Grief comes and goes, though, I suppose, never fully goes. At first, the shock and confusion of what I was supposed to actually do dominated my mind. But friends helped quite a lot with holding me gently and making me know that they cared and were thinking of me.

Now, though, the rentlessness of life is settling back in. I still have to get laundry done, alone. I still have to feed myself, (mostly) alone. I have to clean my apartment and myself, alone. I suppose I did all of those things before you died, but somehow it feels different now that you're gone.

I suppose I don't really know what exactly to say to you. 

You're not here.

I know that some people could probably write you a tome of forgiveness about how beautiful your life was despite the addiction, but I just am not there. And I don't now if I'll ever be there. I won't promise you that.

I went through some of your stuff in the storage unit we rented for you. It was devastating. There was proof of all of your academic accolades from report cards to Mandelbrot Competition certificates to diplomas.

And yet, none of it saved you.

Your intellect did not save you.

You could not rationalize or prove your way out of your alcoholism.

You could not and, now, cannot expunge the pain you put me and my brother--your son--through. We will carry hurt with us forever. We will grow around it--this I know. But I don't see it vanishing.

I do not even know if I'll ever be able to have a glass of wine or a cocktail without first thinking of you and that pain. I'm having a glass of wine now. Perhaps that was a mistake. It's blueberry. You probably wouldn't like it. But, sadly, you'd probably still drink it.

If you were still here, it would be around this time that I'd be figuring out how to spend time with you on or close to your birthday given my work and holiday schedule. I would be struggling with what to give you since so little brought you even a moment of joy in your final months.

A dark part of me wonders if I should've just given you what you'd once asked for--a snuck-in bottle of wine. What difference would it have really made at that point?

I know I wouldn't have. I still have nightmares about you drinking.

I hope you're at peace--if such a thing can even be achieved.

I do miss you. I miss the dad that once cooked twice a week for me, who was proud of me, who once told me having kids was the best decision he ever made. But it has been so long since I've known that dad. But, that dad is still with me. He sits in my heart, even as the other dad that I also knew just as well sits there too.

I don't know if I'll ever write to you for your birthday again.

In case I don't, I love you and I wish we could've had at least a slice of cake together.

Love,

Your Daughter

(Prompt by me)

Photo by Peyman Shojaei on Unsplash


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