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Written in May, 2012 Completed today 08/16/12

One day after getting off of a hectic day at work with my teenage girls I was greeted by my husband and son. It seemed strange but it was also a treat. My husband had a look of despair in his eyes so the feeling of fluffiness stated to fade and then he said, “I have some bad news.”

My mind went straight to the house and I thought we were going to be out a lot of money because something else had broken. Dell waited for me to sit down in the car and then words proceeded out of his mouth that would change my life forever.

“Your Dad died.” That made no sence to me at all. How could he be dead? What happened? It’s not true. Someone was playing a game I thought to myself. I placed my eyes on my husbands facial expressions waiting for him to tell me he was joking, then I realized  he doesn’t joke in that way. It was true, and all I knew to do was run from the place the information was just delivered to me. While the car was still moving I attempted to get out. My husband slammed on the breaks and reached over me to close the door back.

All I could think about next was how I dismissed my Dad the last time we saw each other. How irritated I was with him because I smelled beer on his breath. How I still had his clothes in my basement that I promised him I’d wash and also I still needed to sew and create his curtains! HE couldn’t be dead, I never got a chance to say goodbye!

Some times in life we feel like we have forever and that always is a given. Even though we say things that depict the truth of death, we often live as if tomorrow’s promised. Nothing teaches us the truth better than a loved one suddenly leaving this earth.

For a long while after my father passed away I have dreams at least once a month that he was still alive. The dreams were so vivid and real that I thought they were true for a few seconds after I woke up. In each dream he had tricked me and everyone else about his death and he will be alive. Upon finding put, I was angry and happy at the same time.

I don’t know if that was one of the hardest parts of coming to grips with the death of our relationship or when I had to clear out his apartment. I mean everything I saw from the books to the can of green beans held a memory. I had taken my father to shop at B.J.’s when he first got his place. He had racked up on his vegetables so much so that there was still some left. We really had fun that day.

My point in writing this all out today is still unclear to me, but it’s a process. A life long process because we were never designed to grieve, we were designed by our creator to live. My father passed in January of 2008 at the age of 55. Just the other day I saw one of his friends walking down the street and it took me way back. I only placed my eyes on him for 2 seconds because I was riding in the car, but that’s all it took for the memories to flood my mind and the tears to fill my soul.

The death of my relationship with my father was finalized when I arrived at his apartment and placed my hand on his cold lifeless body that resembled a hard shell. It was 100% clear to me that he was no longer here and that I would have to finish my life without him. I said to him, “You better have really been saved Dad, you better had.”  You see, although this part of our relationship is over, I do plan to see him again on the other side one day, along with my mothers.

Thank you for listening.