A better place

I don't know how to grieve my father. I think about different things I can do to get the mourning process over. His phone number is still in my cel phone and when I skim across it, I always hesitate thinking one day i'll dial it. Maybe he'll pick up.

There should be an easy way out of loving someone. Some way to cut them from your memory and heart. I want the easy way. To erase the memory that hurts so much. How can love hurt so much?

I wrote a list about what my father would do if he were still alive. How he would get on my nerves and make rude comments about people I love and those irritating things.

When they say the dead linger, I think of Dad. He lingers--in my head, he has his daily say. He would never worry about remembrance. That was a given.

So how does one grieve? Is there a way out? Does it get easier? How to get past it? Throw it away and move on? It gets old and stale, but sticks like old glue.

It hurts to read anything I've written about my father. I see short descriptions of him and ache, wanting to see him. There is a justification for death I'm told. We need it. Incurable. Might as well accept it, not a thing you can do...

There's no consolation in that unless I manage to delude myself into thinking I would see loved ones in an afterlife. I can't make that stretch. I never could. Death is something we need to rid ourselves of. It won't bring my father back, but those you love will not leave. They may change, but they will not leave you.

I have hated the world for awhile. I blame everything for my father's death. Those who seem to think they know the secrets of life and death tell me he's went on to something better. When I hear this, I feel like striking them dead. Let's see where they go.

Let's qualify better. My father's body was cremated and the ashes spread over his beloved Clearlake. He is no longer in the world. Death is the end. You can no longer give or receive. You are no longer. Program ends. There is no YOU.

Reward in death is a delusion. It may be a comforting for some, but for those of us who do not sign up for that particular trip, it's harmful listening to people say our loved ones are better off without us.

There was a feeble attempt on my part to write an essay about my father. I thought it would put an end to the pain of his absence, but words don't help. I still want to ring him up and hear his voice and then realize he is no longer there. Utter silence from that room in the house.

I am of the opinion that Dad ended his own life to end the pain he suffered in this world. Not believing in much beyond death, he did believe in the end of the story and his had come. By taking his life, he took an action he believed was by choice.

I would disagree with the choice part. Pain causes certain mental processes to break down. Believing death or the end is better is not a choice one would make if made with clarity, unless one knows there is no end to the suffering in their life.

No one wants to continue hurting. If the continue part means pain, there is only one alternative and that's not much of a choice. Not one we would normally make. He held on as long as he could and then wrote the ending, without note.

There is no closure when we lose people we love. They are gone and our lives are poorer for it. We miss their presence in the world. There is no consolation for their absence, we just keep going and hope the pain of their absence doesn't overwhelm us, though sometimes it will.

I can't say I don't think about my father every day. I do. Not warm, fuzzy thoughts of memorable moments in his life. What would I say to him if I could talk to him now? Would we talk about the weather? Would we say all the things we didn't say while he lived?

I would want to go yard sales with him again. Sit by the lake with coffee in hand and talk about life. I would listen to one of his stories about his friends and tell him something of mine. I would like to hear his thoughts about the current administration. I would like to hear anything from him.

I don't know if the pain of losing a father lessens. I want to talk to him daily, but I don't have the same pain daily. I can't call my brothers, because the reminder of Dad is too harsh and vivid while speaking with them. It's like a stab in the eye at times. They feel it too.

I believe at some point there will be an ebbing of this hurt. The pain will fall away, shed like skin and though I will have his memory, it will not be tinged with something so sharp and bitter.

There is a lesson in the death of someone I have loved so much. That though life can be painful and they may not meet my expectations, none of that matters. They are loved, as am I. Expectations of life can deny us so much, but when we're deprived of love, that is death.

Death is not better.