...this wave of sadness that hits every few months. I wonder what it would be like to have him still around. (To have them both around). I wonder if I would have made the same mistakes.
Would he be able to give me the answers I can't find in a dictionary, the man who knew something about everything? Would he fix all my broken toys? Mend my broken heart? Would he buy me, and 36 of my closest friends, the latest gadget or gizmo that is sure to be a crazy, sold-out-by-Christmas-but-forgotten-about-by-New-Years? Would he still draw out routes on maps in different color pens? Or would he have mastered using the google maps on the internet? (I'm not sure he ever had the pleasure of sending an e-mail on his own). Or dare I say, a G.P.S? He would have never gotten a G.P.S!
Could he have ever really watched EVERY World War II documentary, or covered up his tears during a sappy "chick-flick"? When would he have stopped doing all the yard work himself? Would he have ever organized the mail or thrown ANYTHING away? How many Navy stories has he never told me? Do I actually remember any of them? Would we have ever gone on an adventure together? One more than driving across PA through the night and being lost just outside of campus at 4am, looking for the "entrance," having to stop to ask the first person we saw on the streets, who was dressed all in black with shiny metal things sticking out of his face and covered in tattoos. Would he really have disowned me for getting tattoos myself? Would I have gotten so many?
Would I have taken his advice? Could he truly talk to me without yelling and actually listen? Would he even understand me? What else would he have taught me? Would he have shared his love of words with me on the same level? Would I be reading to him now, like he did for me when I sat in the swivel kitchen chair with my feet not able to touch the ground as we took an adventure at sea on the Pequod? Would we whistle in harmony as we built something together? Would he have ever been able to tell one of his jokes without cracking up? Will I ever be able to tell a joke without cracking myself up?
Would I still have become more and more like him every day, the latter him that was all good and perfect? Would I still be me?
I know I have grown, on my own. In between the dry seasons I wilted away to almost nothing. But I have sprung back after the passing rains. But I would not be who I am without him. I am him and he will always be a part of me, but still I am lost at times.
For as much as I am missing out, I do not need a care taker.
I just need my Daddy.
(Happy Birthday).
