My Father

Anniversary dates have their way of causing you to look back.

January 14 is one of those dates.

I don’t often like to look back on things that are gone. I’m not one to perseverate.  But, I almost always work to schedule it in on anniversary dates, because I also don’t want to forget.

This was the date of my father’s last day.

I think back to Mom standing beside his hospital bed in those last moments and repositioning his pillow.  One of the last things she would have ever done for him.  She noticed lent and couldn’t let it stay.  She tucked him in a little tighter under his sheets.  She knew he’d be cold.  His later years brought him constant cold.  I couldn’t help but pay attention to his five foot nothing frame underneath his bedding and thought what a giant this man was. My father’s presence was larger than life.

Mom removed a latex glove to swipe his hair across his forehead with her fingertips. He knew this touch.  I imagined even needing it.  She didn’t say anything as she repeated this motion.  I knew her mind was occupied.  I suspect it was replaying the sixty-six years of marital memories that was coming to its end. Likely those memories only the two of them shared.  Likely those no one else need know.

I can’t help but think back to my father’s life that now feels so heroic.  A man who used his years so nobly to guard his children. His prudent protections spared us from childhood tragedies. His shrewd safekeeping spared us from a life of any lamentable affairs. He was our passionate protector. He never absolved himself from any responsibility or duty to do what was right at the time and cared less what others thought in the present to do what was best for our future.

He gave us a life worth remembering not regretting.  He left us a past to treasure not history to hide.

It’s to his good Lord and mine that I give great thanks.

Indeed, the means for an imposing figure.

Read:  1 Corinthians 15:57

Three years is apparently some “sweet spot” for achieving proficiency.

Can you possibly achieve proficiency in dealing with the loss of a loved one?  That means to be accomplished and good at it.

I don’t think I could say that.