--I’VE GOT MY BEST SMILE ON ONLY IT’S ON BACKWARD

My dad died at 1:05 am Sunday morning.

I was not there.

That’s a good thing.  I couldn’t have seen him pass.  It was difficult enough watching him on that hospital gurney/bed.   Honestly, he looked like a slain monster.  He looked horrible.

Technically, you should know, that he is really not my dad—not my biological dad—though he essentially raised me from age six, a few months after my mother’s second divorce.

But by all accounts he is my dad. 

Was my dad.

 

I don’t identify with people who have that yearning to be connected to their biological parents, kids who were unfortunately given up for adoption and search and search for their biological parents

. 

What is the point?  After all, it’s just sperm, isn’t it?  Being a parent is a lot more than having sex and then retrieving your child from the hospital.  A lot more.

Being a parent is about being present and aware.  Teaching.  Loving.  Signaling.  Laughing.  Touching.  Explaining…  

And that’s what makes all of these last few days so interesting. 

Okay, maybe not so much interesting as confusing.

My (step) dad was a simple man, yet complicated, intimidated by a wicked (truly) woman who just happened to be my mother. 

Bad things happened when I was a kid. 

Most of the bad things happened to my siblings. 

If I told you what those things were, you wouldn’t even believe me.

Now all those memories have resurfaced.  I wish they wouldn’t, but they have.

And there’s mortality to think about, the circle of life, going from child to (essentially) child again, helpless to helpless.

But in between is where the glory is.  In between is the joy.

Let’s grab it while we can.