The memory of my father
lives on in a number of ways
I’ve found a number of old journals and USBs FULL of writing from the last ten years.
This piece I wrote in 2015 stood out to me today. Maybe because Father’s Day is coming up in Australia. Or maybe because I spoke with my older brother this afternoon. We speak every couple of weeks as we live thousands of kilometres apart.
*****
We drove past our father’s house, my younger brother, older brother and I.
“I don’t like it,” my younger brother said as we slowed the car down to get a good look.
The new owners had tidied things up. Cut down some trees and taken down some fencing.
My Dad lived at the one address his whole life. He never filled out a change of address form, never called a removallist, never clicked on realestate.com.
His father died at that address.
He raised his family (us kids) at that address.
He made some of the best and worst decisions of his life at that address.
But he doesn’t live there any more, my Dad. He doesn’t live anywhere anymore.
He left us, left earth a few years ago now. For some reason I can’t remember the date.
Can never remember the date.
I can’t figure out if it’s a protection mechanism.
My brain refuses to log the memory of the day. If you have ever sat with someone at the moment of their death, it will go down as one of the most bizarre moments of your life. And I mean bizarre. It is the changing of the world in such a monumental way, in the mere split of a second. The time it takes to take a breathe. And then not take one.
My dad had cancer, was knocked out on pain meds in hospital in his final few days. “Make me comfortable but don’t drag it on.”
As I held my father’s left hand and my younger brother held his right, with Dad’s siblings standing around the end of his bed, death entered the room and took him right before our eyes.
It’s slow, hours in the making. And then all of a sudden they're gone.
My dad was too young, only 60. “I know we all have to die Will, but all I want are just a few more years.” The ache in my heart from that moment still echoes.
Back at the house that is no longer his house, “I don’t come here anymore,” said my older brother as we started to pick up speed again. “I want to remember it how it was, not how it is.”
My Dad may not live here any more, but thankfully he’s still around.
He’s in a song, in a smell, in a saying and in my brothers’ voices.
And for that I am grateful.
