As the five-year mark of my dad being gone was approaching, I kept thinking about how society obsesses over “milestones”. When a restaurant sign says, “Celebrating 30 years in business!” or a band announces their “20th anniversary tour” or at work when anniversaries are only acknowledged in five-year increments. Standard party decorations never have “44th birthday” plates or balloons but they always have “50th birthday.” People anticipate these milestones and make big plans to recognize their made-up significance. Why do we do this? Time isn’t even real!!!!
These milestones are only ever celebratory until it comes to death. I don’t know if other people have felt this but as my dad’s five-year death date approached, I had this overwhelming feeling of dread. Like “Damn, five years? How is that possible?” This time around has felt so much heavier, and the number five feels so immense. Is it because it’s a “milestone year”? Is it because typically when we’re talking about something making it five years, it’s happy and exciting? For death, it is a reminder of how much time as gone by without that person in your life. Five years of memories they are not in. Five years of celebrations they weren’t at. Five years of core experiences that did not involve them.
What makes it even harder is that people stop checking in. No one is reaching out on a random Tuesday to ask how I am even though the grief is omnipresent. Most friends and family don’t acknowledge May 10th or send a sympathy text on Father’s Day, but it would truly mean the world if they did. Just because I’m making dead dad jokes doesn’t mean I’m healed. On the surface, it may seem as if nothing is wrong, but my mind and my heart are constantly sad. The grief doesn’t go away, I just find ways to live with it and sometimes that includes really morbid jokes.
I fear the day my dad is not regularly on my mind because I fear that will lead to forgetting him. I hope I always experience constant reminders of him like I do now. I think of him when there’s a thunderstorm, when All Star by Smash Mouth plays, when Lucas laughs and his shoulders shake just like his did, when I see an unkempt lawn, when someone asks about my name, when we order calamari at dinner, when I see a rainbow. One of my favorite things about him was his appreciation for nature. Rainbows, sunsets, dolphins, lightning bugs, horses, puddles, and wildflowers are just a few that never went ignored. Whenever nature is showing off, I hear him saying, “Cal, look at that!” I promise to never stop looking.
Over the last five years, he has missed so much. Lucas graduated college and established a career, my little cousins turned into men, his 60th birthday, and my 30th birthday (more societal milestones!!!!). I moved out and turned into the bird-obsessed, plant-loving daughter I was destined to be. Wordle was discovered before evolving into The New York Times Games. I imagine the two of us would be sending our results to each other every morning and comparing scores. He was the smartest person I will ever know, and I think he would get a kick out of my friends saying I’m the only reason we go to trivia.
I feel myself already mourning the future because it won’t include him. I have been to six weddings since he died, and I couldn’t watch a single father-daughter dance. Those have been some of the hardest moments knowing I will never have that. He will never have the chance to fail miserably at fighting back tears while walking me down the aisle. He’ll never meet his grandchildren or decide what he wants them to call him. In all honesty, I am dreading seeing my friends’ dads inevitably become Grampas. Happy for them, sad for me.
A huge part of the struggle is with the afterlife of it all. I wish I knew my dad’s stance on a higher power, heaven and hell, mediums, and if he believed the living can connect with the dead. I don’t believe in God and frankly, I think most people only do to find comfort in the unknown (i.e. life after death). Right after he died, an important person in my life at the time reminded me that energy cannot be created or destroyed in an effort to calm my thoughts about what happens when we die. I like to believe that one day when I’m gone, my energy finds his. Until then, I will continue chasing sunsets (literally and figuratively), identifying bird sounds, collecting plants, and spending time with all the crazy people I call family- all thanks to him.
Sarcastically Callie 