Some thoughts

Most of the time on this here site, I like to write about things that make me really happy. Food. Style. Furniture. Denim jumpsuits. But I was thinking about some things yesterday, and decided I’d write a more serious post today, both in the spirit of unloading some of my emotions on you (thank you!) and writing something that made me scared to hit ‘Publish.’ The Lululemon bags I see on MUNI tell me I’m supposed to do one thing a day that scares me, so this is my thing for today.

Yesterday was July 13, 2011. Seventeen years before, on that exact date, my father died. I was 9 years old.

The crazy thing about yesterday is I didn’t even realize what day it really was until about 4:45 in the afternoon. Chalk it up to a busy day at work, a million other things on my mind. But once I realized that it was July 13th, and did my annual mental calculation of how many years I’ve lived without my dad, I felt a bit sad, a bit regretful, but mostly, I felt filled with wonder.

When you lose a parent, there’s this weird dichotomy in your life. On the one hand, you get so used to living your life without them that it’s almost as if they never existed (and yes, this is hard to think about). On the other, their passing made such an indelible mark on your life that sometimes it feels like you can’t go a day without thinking about them. I’m not trying to sound overly dramatic, but on July 13, 1994 my life absolutely changed forever. There are countless traits in my personality that I can trace back to my childhood and his passing. People always talk about their defining moments — his death is 100%, without a shadow of a doubt, mine.

Anyway, I was thinking about all this on the bus ride home last night, and what I decided to take away as I processed what the last seventeen years has been like is that life is simply incredible. I don’t know how else to explain it. It never ceases to amaze me how surprising, exciting, devastating, humbling, challenging and fun life can be. And as I grow older, and am able to look back on who I was and the person I’m becoming, it is wonderful to reflect on the twists and turns in the road and where each little path had led me. It can be a strange sensation though, because I do still miss him.

One of the hardest things about death is trying to both simultaneously accept that you will never know what a future with that person would’ve looked like (especially when that person was taken from you too soon), while also doing your best to treasure the moments you had together. My father won’t be at my wedding, but I’ll always remember the way he could cook a steak. And his laugh.

Nevertheless, I’ve come to recognize that the woman I am today is not the woman I would’ve been if my father were still around. It’s very scary to accept and embrace that. But after seventeen years, I’m getting closer. And at the end of the day, though I never knew my father as an adult, I am certain he would’ve been proud of me.

To me, that’s all that matters.

{Image Credit: Quentin de Briey}