My Dad's Gift to Me this First Father's Day

So here is reality. The reality that is bringing me peace this Father’s Day. People tell me it is going to be hard because it is first one without my dad, but you know what…I am strangely at peace. Maybe this peace is my dad’s gift to me this Father’s Day.

I have come to realize I for a long time got stuck in the…”how things were supposed to be” rut. Thinking of all the things my dad was supposed to be there for and what we were supposed to do together. Even looking at the summer I told myself he was supposed to be here so we could spend time together. But before my dad passed, I didn’t have summer plans for us.I wasn’t intentioning to spend this summer bonding more. Heck, I wasn’t even planning that for the upcoming Thanksgiving or Christmas break.

It’s not anything bad of me, it’s just reality. Most college students reality I would think. Where you take your parents for granted because you just assume they will be there into your adult life. So you don’t think about spending extra time with them when you are home. You just keep living your life and spend time with them when it gets planned. It’s just the reality of life.

Reality is, had my dad not died I would still be taken him and all the adults in my life for granted. This summer would have probably been like ones in the past. I would have been working and living at my mom’s and going by my dad’s house on occasion. Maybe we would have gone bowling or taken a trip like we did to Denver last summer, but he would have been working so juggling his work schedule and mine, we probably really wouldn’t have spent much more time together than normal.

I almost feel it’s a blessing he is gone. It has made me appreciate everything he is to me. Not WAS, but IS. Because I still feel him every day. I feel us. I know he is still guiding me and I see him sprinkling my path with little miracles. Driving his car now, I feel he is with me on all my travels. Going to Knoxville in a few weeks I felt I was on my own for the first time traveling, but now I feel like he will be with me. Now he is always with me. No planning. No juggling jobs. Just a simple gaze into the sky, or closing of my eyes, and I feel him.

Yes, I miss him. Yes, it’s not the same. Yes, I wish he was here and I still get stuck saying he should have been here or was supposed to be here, but reality is, he wasn’t. The way my dad died, the way things lined up. The fact there was no freak accident or murder or poision or anything. The fact he just died, it makes me know it was God’s timing which means things right now are exactly as they are supposed to be.

So I am going to spend this Father’s Day as I think my dad would have wanted. I am not going to hide from the meaning of the day and try to treat it like just another day because it’s not. Instead I am going to tell my dad happy Father’s Day, knowing he will hear me in heaven, and then I am going to honor those who my dad left behind to be fathers to me while me and him are apart. That is how my dad would have handled this first Father’s Day without his dad. But he gets to be with his dad which is good so now my grandpa won’t have to miss a Father’s Day without his kids. And I will celebrate Father’s Day. Celebrate the man my dad was to me, and the men who are “fathers” to me now. Love you papa. Happy Father’s Day. 

P.S: I am doing one thing to celebrate my dad this Father's Day. It is the last dining hall bagel I have from school. They just happen to be running out today. Today happens to be the last one. When I realized this I decided to make sure the last one was cinnamon raisin. One of my dad's favorite. And will be doing it with fat free cream cheese, which is terrifying for me. But my dad loved bagel and cream cheese...especially with sausage. Yes, even on cinnamon raisin. So my bagel today be cinnamon raisin with fat free cream cheese. Dad and I hadn't gone out to restaraunt in Father's Day in years...so this be a way we can. Another blessing from this loss. A way to kick ED to the curb for my papa. Had he been alive I probably wouldn't have gone out for dinner or eaten anything special for him. It wouldn't have mattered. I would have just taken him bowling or something....maybe cooked him something....and definitely gotten him a gift. But I think he would have traded all the gifts and all the bowling and smiled to see me eat this bagel with him. So this is for you Papa...love you.