Twenty-Eight.

One year ago today, I lost the person who believed in me the most.  The one who never judged me by my hair color and even encouraged it (knowing that it pissed off my mom).  The one who told me to stay out of trouble and if I couldn’t not to get myself caught.  I lost my father.

Here we are a year later, and if anything it hurts even more than it did when he first passed.  I think I was too much in shock then, and was just so numb to it all.  I had a lot of other crazy things going on at the time and I just think I really never had my time to grieve then.  Part of me, I think, kept me from grieving because I knew he would not want me to.  I knew that he wouldn’t want my brother and I to stop our lives because of him, and I knew that he wasn’t suffering anymore.

This is one of my favorite pictures that I have of my dad.  I have it up on my mirror and I look up at it everyday.  This is how I like to remember him, not withered and sickly like he was when he died.  My dad always looked great and a good ten years younger than he was until he got sick; the ALS just ate him away.  I think that was one of the things that was the most frightening, watching my father turn into something I never thought I would see.

My dad lived a full life.  He always had the best stories, and there were so many still that he had left to tell me.  He taught me how to cook.  He taught me that it was okay to be myself, no matter who disapproved of how I chose to express myself.  He tried to teach me what he knew about cars and to play the guitar, but we both didn’t have enough patience.

We didn’t always get a long and there were times where we did not talk for a long while, but he was always there for me when I needed him most (like to save me when my mother was being crazy).  I will always be thankful for that, and I will never forget it.

I had a dream a while back that my dad was drinking on a cruise ship with my grandparents having a good ole time.  It was a nice dream.  Everyone I loved who had passed where there.  They all looked so young, and healthy.   My Nanny and Aunt Margret were making me run around with drinks and Baba was grilling, and my dad was drinking. (Well to be fair everyone was drinking; but everyone knows my dad liked to drink. So did my Nanny.)  They were all so happy, and I know that they all are happy now.

I wish you were here daddy.

I love you and miss you.