Although you are far away Dad

Although you are far away on Father’s Day you’re still here

in my heart in the very warmest way.

I miss my Dad.  My heart and eyes well up with tearful emotion today.  I can’t seem to help it nor control it since yesterday.  And others around me who have not lost their fathers, don’t understand.  I know I didn’t understand until he passed away.  It’s one of those that you don’t seem to really ‘get it’ until you’ve experienced it yourself.  There’s no amount of people telling you how hard or different it is to lose a parent that explains it as well as enduring it on your own.  And then, when it happens, you understand.

Dad and I didn’t always get along and we didn’t understand each other ~ or maybe I should say we understood each other too well, so that’s why we didn’t get along. 🙂   One of my Mom and Sissy’s favorite jabs is to say I am like my Dad.  And truth be told, I am, in many ways.  This is the 2nd Father’s Day without him and I can now say that with a lopsided smile so I guess I am healing.

My Dad was unusual.  He was adored by many and during his time on Earth, he helped many people who were hurting.  Since his passing I have heard stories of how ‘just by being him,’ he helped people get back on their feet who had fallen down, as well as being there for many people’s deaths when there was nobody around.  His powerful life force and connection to others still lingers in those who remain here on Earth.  He was quirky and downright bossy to all.  He did things his way or you could head to the highway.  He was uber-organized, had the most amazing memory for time, dates, people and delighted in telling you the entire ancestry of whomever he was talking about because he knew them so well.  He was an old-time businessman who had clients for generations on end and could help with family matters because he knew the intricate relationships between family members and how to help accomplish what was needed.  One client in particular had nobody left, having outlived her entire family.  He called her every single morning to talk with her until she passed and then quietly made sure that she was buried properly with people in attendance so that she wouldn’t be alone.

On the flip side, he had a mean streak too, cursing up a storm and demanding that things been done the way he wanted them to be done.  On the whole, I guess I’d admit, he was human.  I harshly judged his foibles when I was hurting.  I couldn’t see past the ‘sins’ that so plainly sat in my view.  Childhood memories to present knowledge yawned before me, an ugly litany of what he did, what he said and how we was.  This went on for a long time during his lifetime and after his death.  What I didn’t realize was how much I was hurting and as always, I’d stayed quiet, never daring to reveal how I felt and what I knew.  Instead, I simmered my anger, spewing my sadness once it was too late to speak with him.

Time passed.  Tears flowed.  I tired of feeling so badly, but couldn’t find the way to forgive.  And then I found a wondrous book which changed by life.  It’s a child’s book which I repeatedly read slowly and then it finally dawned on me how I was able to begin the healing process by forgiveness.  The Little Soul and the Sun by Neale Donald Walsch changed me by beginning the healing process in my life.  After I read it, I could see that many times what I ‘saw plainly through my eyes’ as him belittling me, hurting me intentionally etc, was nothing more than his teaching me to be strong and to be blessed.  There were so many a-ha moments after I took the book’s story to heart that they are too numerous to mention, but just as powerful and life-changing to me.

Dad taught me about forgiveness and how to accept others the way we want to be accepted.  He taught me about love, about the power of prayer and emphasized keeping in touch with others.  He showed me the gift of reaching out hand and heart to people in a healing connection.  By example, my Dad left a legacy not of financial solvency, but of unknown numbers of hearts which he touched, he helped and with whom he connected.

So today Dad, no matter how far away you are, you are finally here in my heart, in the warmest way.  I salute you.  I honor your memory and I am grateful that you were mine.

Shine On!

xo

 

 

 

What About You?

It’s coming up on the 2nd anniversary of my Dad’s passing.  The rainy weather, my Mom’s sadness and my increasing melancholy mood isn’t helping the situation.  But then, a blogger friend reached out and a flood of emotion filled her comment page.  I had to stop myself and apologize.  It was as if the floodgates of someone asking, “what about you?” helped me to breathe in and out the emotion that has been ebbing under the surface these last few weeks.  Her simple question and knowing that she had lost her Mom around the same time, gave me the strength of bonding and of opening up to how I feel these days.  And it’s not that great.  I’m sad and I just don’t know why.

Father’s Day is almost here as well which adds its own twist for we had a hard time communicating.  Many times, Dad and I were at odds.  But as the second anniversary looms much of the anger and resentment which bombarded me has dwindled.  In its place remains a quiet understanding, an acceptance, a reluctance to judge a life that I had previously judged.  What remains is a bereft sadness for words left unsaid which I now say in my heart, a gift of forgiveness from me and a request for forgiveness for myself.  I am tired of carrying this burden.  I now try to allow it to rest.

It’s hard to explain how I feel for I think you needed to know the man in order to understand the complexity.  But then, we are all complex and surely there are others who feel similarly in their grief.  To you, I extend my hand and heart, saying the ever understanding words…

What about you?

Shine On!

xo

My heartfelt thanks to LoriLara ~ please stop by to visit her here.

Bright Lights, Empty Chairs

My first Thanksgiving holiday without my Dad was made gentler by the kindness of my friend MLAngel who sent a beautiful arrangement complete with candle.  Her message,

“Let there be a bright light and not be an empty chair at your table.”

Isn’t that a lovely quote?  So I will pass it along to your tables this holiday season…may you have bright lights and not empty chairs as well.  Who is living in your hearts?  And when it’s time for you to pass, in whose hearts will your memory be brightly lit?  I think it’s a good thing to think about as we go about the hustle and bustle of life.  I try to Make A Difference every day in a small way in someone else’s life.  It’s not an ego driven sort of difference, it’s just a simple, “I care” sort of difference that it sometimes so subtle and yet so important.

So I light my candle for all who have passed and for those who are missing from your tables as well.  May you remember them fondly, with love and happy memories only.

Shine On!

xo

A Silent Journey

Original from Cafe Grace on Facebook

I am a people pleaser at heart.  In the family unit, I was the peacekeeper as well and the one who tried to mother everyone in sight.  I can’t say if it was innate or if it was a role given to me, but it was one that I tried to accomplish with gusto.  I ran around trying to help everyone, anxiously trying to make things better and keep people happy.  I would try not to ‘upset the apple cart’ on many occasions.  I was never good at confrontation and hid from it when I could.  I would rather just be peaceful and have everyone love me.

Simply put, I wanted to love them all and have them all love me.

But the last year and a 1/2 since my Dad’s passing, things have changed in me.  There’s been a break in the charm department in my life.  It’s like a crater has opened up in my heart and shown me that while I have been trying hard to please everyone in my life for so long, I have not pleased myself at all.  While I’ve been mothering the world, I’ve not mothered myself.  When there have been times I could have stood up for myself, I sat down instead and seethed.  I lived fearing that they wouldn’t love me if I didn’t meet others’ expectations and I’ve now found out that I’m right.  And it hurts.

It’s not been easy for me since my Dad passed.  I’ve tried to soldier on as best as I could.  I’ve tried to pay attention to those who needed it and tried to please the rest.  I know I’ve not done a great job, but I truly can say that I’ve tried.  Something snapped in me though and when it did, I admit that I acted out a bit.  Quite out of the ordinary for me for sure and it took everyone by storm.  It was not met with kindness and I just couldn’t explain my stubbornness.  I think I just had a temper tantrum that’s lasted and the silence that’s built up from it is deafening.

It’s very lonely in this transitional time for me.  Beloved family members have silenced me by refusing to say that they love me.  On the outside, they act normally, but we both know that they are hurt as am I.  This intense silent treatment has been hard for us all.  I don’t know how to fix things, but I know that I can’t go back to not speaking up.  I admit that I swung like a pendulum from being a people pleaser to growling at the mere mention of doing what I didn’t feel like doing.  I know it’s been a heartache as most growing pains tend to be.

Perhaps it’s my way of dealing with my overbearing father’s passing that I now don’t want anyone else to control me so I’ve become like a rebellious teenager.  Dealing with his death, 4 surgeries and learning on my own how to close his business, plus being a wife/mom, running our house plus my Mom’s was a lot for me to handle in a year ~ not to mention the grief which churned up so many memories and feelings that I had stuffed down for years.  I just don’t think anyone realized how much it was for me to handle and quite frankly, I was too busy just trying to make it through each day without doing something wrong that I wouldn’t ask for help.  In retrospect, I can see now how foolish I was because when I was drowning, I just kept trying to dog paddle my way through the days.

Because I was never given the opportunity to act up and I guess I did it with gusto.  If I’ve hurt anyone, it’s not that I meant to at all.  I just needed to find me and it’s been a long, hard, lonely journey because nobody seems to understand.  There’s so much that I dare not say, so much grieving that I’ve done alone, so much that I’ve had to forgive and let go.

I still cry for the loss of my Dad, which is a conundrum because our relationship was quite rocky ~ in fact, I cried this morning.  Grief does that I think, it sneaks up and gooses you at the strangest times.  Who knew that getting rid of my Dad’s phone number would send me in to a wailing tailspin?  Perhaps my tear ducts needed a good cleaning ~ yes, that’s it.  Believe me, they don’t need to be cleared out for another 2 years after this episode.

In the meantime, I am working on finding out who I am and not needing approval which is hard for a people pleaser like me.  It’s a long road ahead, but I’ll just keep taking my baby steps and hope that others will understand ~ I love you ~ I need you ~ I’m sorry.  Please be patient with me.  I simply am who I am.

Shine On!

xo

Daily Prompt: A Source of Anxiety

Write about a noise — or even a silence — that won’t go away. (We’ll let you interpret this in different ways…)

Photographers, artists, poets: show us ANXIETY.

http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/12/09/source-of-anxiety/