My Dad...

This past Friday my father passed away. The reality is just beginning to settle in, as this was a man who battled (and beat) cancer 25 years ago, and after a 1997 quadruple bypass managed to outlive his expected 5-6 years by double that amount. We often joked that 20 years from now we would still have him around defying the odds, sitting outside, having a smoke and greeting the neighbors who all knew and loved him... Now, flowers mark the place where he once held court...

This is my first experience with someone so close to me passing away. I was close with my grandmother, sure, but the generational disparity there alone assured me some distance when the inevitable happened there, thirteen months ago. I had lost a good friend very unexpectedly in an automobile accident during the Christmas season, 2002. But a familial loss is different.

Suddenly, all the little nuances and attributes of my relationship with my father took on greater resonance. Things that I had long forgotten about resurfaced. The personality traits of his that were less than spectacular took a backseat to memories of him taking my friends and me to drive-in movies and rides to the mall or the skating rink on weekend nights. Of he and I doing the dishes in the kitchen while I blared records from the den, enlightening him to the Stray Cats, Blondie, the Ramones, and Culture Club. "What's Blondie been up to these days?" he would often ask, as recently as a few years ago... He was proud of my owning my former business, and was very inquisitive about my new job in real estate. He was also happy and supportive of my personal relationships, and got to meet Greg and his parents-- That I am particularly happy about!

I was also happy to have been a relatively frequent visitor to Hawaii, where I got to see him on a somewhat recurring basis over the years. We weren't HUGE communicators, to be honest, but we always talked about my friends that he remembered from when I was growing up, about books that he had been reading, and about my nieces (his grandchildren) who were his pride and joy. Dad was happy to keep to himself, was happy to lose himself in a good spy novel, and to keep me updated on any hijinks involving Yasmin, Jihan, or his other buddies (the cats!).

The fact that he wasnt overly forthcoming about any mysteries surrounding his own upbringing and family life, nor were any insights shed about a few unanswered questions about things that went on when he was raising us, leaves us with a father who was a flawed guy with a big heart; a simple man on many levels, yet enigmatic to the end...

I love him, and I miss him...