What Not to Say to Death When He Knocks at Your Door

The night was brilliant and clear. The full moon smiled at me from the sky. The stars winked and the wind in the air whispered. I didn't expect to feel this feeling though: the loss of my father. It's been so long, years and years, and for that whole time I never really thought of him. His memory tucked away in some long forgotten fold in my brain's complex layers.

But his face emerged in a dream last night. He was younger than when he passed away. Hair nearly all black, no longer with any gray. Smiling and radiant, he seemed proud of something. But what? I could tell he wanted to me know something, but I was so confused. He didn't talk, or maybe I don't remember that part, but this was the first time I had seen his face since he passed away 15 years ago.

It's funny what grief and loss will do to a person, how it shows up. Perhaps I never wanted to remember him, not at first, the pain being to strong, sharp, stringent. I avoided it somehow, some form of self-preservation, I guess. But that doesn't mean I never loved him, even though I forgot him.