So on Sunday it is my Dad’s anniversary.
12 years.
So much has happened in that period … good things … bad things … things I wish I could have talked to my Dad about and things I’m glad my Dad wasn’t there to see … but as I establish my second decade without him, I have to say I feel I am entering a new stage of the grieving process, a stage I didn’t know existed.
Guilt.
You see the thing is, I don’t think I think about my Dad enough.
When he first died he was always, obviously, always there … behind every thought or conversation … but just recently, I realise I don’t talk or think about him as much as I once did.
Now you could say that after 12 years that is only natural – and maybe that’s right – however it’s only until about a year or so ago that just the thought of my Dad had the capacity to make me cry.
I’ve written many times how I felt I kept the pain of his passing hidden inside a dark box that I didn’t want to open … not just because I didn’t want to come face-to-face with the pain, but because I still didn’t want to accept the fact he had really gone.
Really, truly, undeniably gone.
But for some reason that’s changing.
[The last meal out we had together as a family. Mum’s birthday, 1996]
Of course he’s still in my consciousness, however I now can openly refer to things he did or said without the emotional being revealed in all their painful and overwhelming glory, which is both a good thing and – as I said – one that makes me feel racked with guilt.
You see my Dad – like my Mum – was everything to me.
He guided me, nurtured me and – when necessary – bollocked me and without his influence and, if truth be known, safety net, I always felt I was walking a life of illusion where the next step could lead me into a dead end both personally, professionally and emotionally.
But now it’s different.
I still would give anything to hear his views and advice, but I feel a bit more in control of what I am trying to do … even though I still don’t really know what that is.
A lot of this change seems to have come after he came to say goodbye to me.
Remember that?
It’s the post where I said things that I naturally would consider madness?
Anyway, maybe that – and the simple fact 12 years is quite a long time – is part of the reason I feel a bit different, but whilst I know my Dad’s mischievous side would have loved that he could stop me in my tracks with just a memory or a stare, he’d be far happier to know his son feels a greater sense of optimism and encouragement about all life has to offer – and what he wants it to offer – than he has for quite a few years, because that was one of the key hopes and values he [and Mum] wanted/instilled in me.
So I guess he is still with me after all.
Love you Dad. And thank you.