Okay, here’s the truth. I’m worried you won’t want to come around here anymore if I keep writing about losing my dad. I mean, why would you? Yet he’s on my mind constantly these days, so it feels disingenuous to share anything else right now. I tried yesterday…and I know my post fell flat. I suppose there’s some beauty in just being real with you about that.
Two weeks have already passed. I see my dad everywhere. I hear his voice all the time. I feel his hand on my shoulder. I think about plans we were making – for family trips, for working together, for talks we still wanted to have. I try to get things done and then I lose focus, lose my rhythm, lose my place.
I feel bad for strangers who catch me in my grief. I can go hours unfazed and then sadness crashes in without warning. Suddenly, I’m choking back tears at a coffee shop. Or staring into space in the cereal aisle. Or sobbing through the first part of Keith Urban’s concert {failed to mention that in the last post, didn’t I?}. I shield my eyes from physical reminders – like his picture, like his handwriting, like his emails to me – but then something so small and unexpected rips my heart open anyway.
People keep telling me to move forward one step at a time. Yes, right…but in which direction? Today, I looked at these gorgeous, light-filled woods and imagined walking through them. Which way would I go? How long would it take? Where might I end up? I had no answers, of course. Only a sense that I’d need to keep on keeping on – watching my step, taking it slow, asking for help, feeling my way through.
I know you can’t give me directions, dear ones. I must do this on my own. But if you’ve been at the edge of these woods before, I’d love any advice you have to offer. Thanks for hanging with me.
