Wings

12-6-2024

I thought about Dad all day yesterday, but it failed to occur to me that it was the anniversary of his passing.

Funny how memory works, isn't it? I can't say I'm too surprised. Dad and I didn't care much about marking dates. Birthdays weren't a big deal because we talked to each other all the time.

I could literally just stop in on him and shoot the shit whenever. He was a hard-working man, so I can't say he always greeted me with a smile, because sometimes he was sleeping it off on the couch and I woke him up; but I can say with certainty that he was always glad to see me.

I feel very strongly that he is still with me. Yesterday, we could have been sitting in his living room, drawing a five minute discussion into an hour, making plans for the weekend's big game.

(Once upon a time there was a little baby boy who loved his dad. You'll see them both smiling in that picture there. That boy grew up to be a man. His life didn't go too well, but he's grateful for it nonetheless. He sees himself in third person sometimes, but not because he's emotionally distant from either the sorrow or the joy.

No. Sorrow is but a mask and joy a welcome but passing phase. He sees himself this way so he can take in the transcendant beauty of the entire experience and appreciate it in a way that honors it, more so than the capricious feeling of the moment, which only wants more of itself, whatever it is.

See, look at him! Bawling like a baby, sitting at his computer, typing this out. He woke up early, a quarter to four in the morning, and couldn't get it out of his mind. He just had to write it down. Does the writer exploit grief or does grief exploit the writer?)

There is no shame here. Life is truly beautiful.

I only ever once knew that Dad cried. It was at his mother's funeral.

Grammeez, we called her. She was a saint, and he took care of her until the end, often pressing my brother and I into service as well. We happily obliged.

At her funeral, he went to the bathroom. He came back and said, simply, that he went to the bathroom to cry. It was a matter of fact, not a statement that needed clarification or discussion. He wasn't ashamed to admit it. Wiping tears from my own eyes, I patted him on the shoulder.

There wasn't need for a dialogue. He was a tough dude with a warm heart and he loved his mom.

If you've enountered my work before, dear reader, then you know I'm a thinker. An overthinker? A deep thinker? An irritating nit-picker? I leave that for other people to decide. I can no more arrest the profound twistings and turnings of my mind than Dad could have stopped from shedding tears for Grammeez.

So I write it down, because most people don't want to hear it, and there's not time enough in the day for me to have the dialogue anyway. I'm a hard-working man too, and the time labor has eaten away is permanently lost.

I never did it for me, though I often wonder what it all amounts to.

I remember all the trouble Dad went through trying to acquire medical care when he started to decline. Neither the employers who broke his body nor the government that stole his income were there to help him in the end.

Dad worked for everything he had and shared it freely with everyone he loved.

Somewhere there's a family grieving a man who made millions from denying people medical care.

Right or wrong, I don't feel sorry for the man, considering what my father went through. I consider his kids innocent bystanders, but I just can't help but think he got what he paid for: a bullet with his name on it. After all, how many lives did he take with nothing more than a signature while he raked in the cash?

If you make money at other people's expense, it's hard for me to make a case in your favor.

But it does make me sad to think that in a world where there's plenty enough to go around, people have to turn to violence to get others to come up off something they never needed in the first place.

And it's questionable whether the greedy bastards will ever learn their lesson, whether the violence makes any real difference.

Abraham Lincoln shared this sentiment at the conclusion of his inaugural address:

"I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature."

Of course, this attempt to reconcile concerns from both sides fell on deaf ears. War ensued.

So what's it all for?

It's for those five-minute conversations that stretch into an hour.

It's for those tears shed that remind us that we lost something precious, and how thankful we are to have had it at all.

It's for the smiling parents holding the smiling babies.

No amount of money will replace that time, it has passed.

No amount of money will buy these bittersweet tears, they are shed.

No amount of money will grow that smile, it was loved, its light has shined.

No amount of money can pay for this moment. It is all we have. It is all we will ever have.

No amount of money will ever replace Dad, Mom, Grammeez...

This is a stream of consciousness piece. I'm sharing my raw, unfiltered emotions here. But I'm sure, dear reader, that you have a list of names too.

Whatever your take on the day's political strife, I urge you to take a moment and remember them, or perhaps, as I did yesterday, to acknowledge that they are still very much there, right by your side.

It may be sad to think that the better angels of our nature must pass from this world to earn their wings, but take heart in the knowledge that one day, if you honor their guidance, you will fly by their side again.

***** * *****

Four years ago today: