On May 18th, 1983, my dad died. It wasn’t cancer, or an auto accident; not hypertension, CVD, or Hepatitis C. He died because he killed himself.
Needless to say, the man had issues.
But I was six, I don’t remember (many of) the issues. I remember little magic tricks; a compulsion to tease one if it would make everyone else laugh; cans of mandarin oranges in the Christmas stocking because “it’s not Christmas without mandarin oranges”; watching him and my brother shooting rifles in the woods; dark hair, dark eyes, and an even darker smile–something was eating that man; I remember the painting of a tiger he made (it was stolen, along with everything else I owned, in 98); I remember his love of photography, rural life, science, and acoustic guitar; I remember long train rides, short answers, and questioning looks….
The man had issues, sure, we all have issues, but the man didn’t get something that seems pretty basic to me: you don’t go out because there are things bringing you down, you go on because there are things bringing you up. I accept that some things I’ve been through will never stop hurting, time does not heal every wound, but I also know that around the next corner is something delighting. I don’t live for the pain, I live because of conversations, stories, art, poetry, music, experience, circus, movement, relationships–and yes, relationship failures. All the wonderful little things, warm kittens, hot coffee, daydreaming, and funny textures below my fingertips.
I miss you dad. Honest truth: I doubt you’d be proud of me (but you’d be proud of Gannon! that man has done well!), but you wouldn’t be ashamed of me either. Your sister always thought I was a changling babe, and maybe I was, I don’t know. What I do know is I’m not going out like you. No. I’m going to go out the way nature intended, the way millions of years of ancestors went out: by picking a fight with tasty-looking woodland creatures… or maybe of old age in my bed. That’s cool too.
Also, maybe I shouldn’t blog with insomnia.
-Ugly Elf
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