The Gift of Saying Goodbye

It's never easy to lose a loved one.  Whether he is young or old, terminally ill or in the prime of his life, there is always pain.  There is always a void.

That being granted, one of the most underappreciated gifts is the opportunity to say goodbye.  

I never had the opportunity to say goodbye to Mom.

Not really.

I was at the theater watching The Return of the King the night she choked and had to be resuscitated. 

She was never conscious again.  

She lay in that hospital bed as we wondered about the future.  The machines kept her blood circulating and we gave her permission to find her rest.

We may have said our goodbyes, but I don't think she heard them.  If she heard them, she couldn't reply.

We never dreamt we would lose our father as suddenly, indeed, more suddenly, than we had our mother.

Mom had been sick most of my childhood.  Dad had always been relatively healthy.

Mom had suffered a stroke--not her first--about a year before she passed.  Dad chronically minimized any health issues he may have been having.

As morbid as it may seem, I think we all silently assumed Dad would live to be a crotchety old man, slowly embittered by dementia stealing his mind. 

There are moments in life that cannot be forgotten.

My stepmother went to check on him.  My phone was on silent.  She had forgotten her phone, so she used my dad's.  

When I opened the screen to multiple missed calls and urgent text messages, I knew he was gone.

I still have the text thread on my phone.

I sometimes wonder what I would have said, given the chance.

As a general rule, we have never been the type of family to talk about the important things.  

At 14 I don't think I would have been mature enough to say what I should have--what I was really thinking and feeling.  

I know I would have told her I loved her.  I should have told her that it wasn't her fault and that I was sorry I hadn't been more affectionate.  

At 31, and with significantly more baggage, I would have had more to say to him.  I would have said those words that he never said--I love you.  I would forgiven him--for what I'm not even sure.  I would have thanked him for teaching me to think and read and make church a priority.  I would have told him that, all things considered, I was glad he was my dad.

On this his 70th birthday, I find myself thinking about him.  Thinking about Mom.  Thinking about what losing them both suddenly has meant, has done, to me. 

I think I had finally adjusted to Mom's passing as I was entering my 30s.  You never get over it, but I do believe I had processed it.  I had come to understand, intellectually and emotionally, how suddenly losing her had impacted my life, my decisions, my personality.

Here we go again.