Something I need to do... though I wish I didn't have to
In a little under ten months, it will be the fifth anniversary of my dad's death. It's strange to think that he's been gone this long already. There are still times when I think back and feel both the pain of his passing and the pain of his living almost as strongly as I did then.
I know it's hard for Jennifer to understand sometimes why I still randomly get all ranty about him... but, for all her father's own faults, he's still here. Her father is not only still here, he's still here for her.
I guess I just feel in some ways that I can't ever really let go of how he made me feel, because I want to ensure that I never do the same thing to my own children. I don't ever want to be so complacent as to trust that I am different enough from him to not make the same mistakes.
I'd decided a little while back that I needed to something this time to commemorate my dad, to honor his memory. There is no gravesite, we scattered his ashes in the Gulf of Mexico. I was walking through a local hobby shop this afternoon when I saw the very thing that primed my creative engine. There was a model locomotive engine done in the old Cotton Belt Railroad colors in one of the cases. I say "was" because it's sitting on my table now.
For my dad's memory, I'm going to build a display case with pictures and mementos of the best things in his life. There will always be a monument to the worst of him inside me... so I want to build a monument to remind me and others of what he did that was worthwhile. He and my grandfather were career railroad men. There was nothing my dad loved more than driving trains. So, my monument to his life will start there - with a simple model of a Cotton Belt train.
I know it's hard for Jennifer to understand sometimes why I still randomly get all ranty about him... but, for all her father's own faults, he's still here. Her father is not only still here, he's still here for her.
I guess I just feel in some ways that I can't ever really let go of how he made me feel, because I want to ensure that I never do the same thing to my own children. I don't ever want to be so complacent as to trust that I am different enough from him to not make the same mistakes.
I'd decided a little while back that I needed to something this time to commemorate my dad, to honor his memory. There is no gravesite, we scattered his ashes in the Gulf of Mexico. I was walking through a local hobby shop this afternoon when I saw the very thing that primed my creative engine. There was a model locomotive engine done in the old Cotton Belt Railroad colors in one of the cases. I say "was" because it's sitting on my table now.
For my dad's memory, I'm going to build a display case with pictures and mementos of the best things in his life. There will always be a monument to the worst of him inside me... so I want to build a monument to remind me and others of what he did that was worthwhile. He and my grandfather were career railroad men. There was nothing my dad loved more than driving trains. So, my monument to his life will start there - with a simple model of a Cotton Belt train.