I never post here anymore
I honestly rarely log in, but I had no where else to put this.
Today my son is 843 days old, which is exactly how old I was the day my father died. I’ve been thinking about this a lot as the day has approached and I don’t know if there’s any real significance to it, but there’s two salient points that have come to mind.
1) Having never really known my father, I never gave much thought to how much he actually knew me. Mind you my son’s only 2 years old, but he asks questions, laughs at jokes, and every day he amazes me with his rapidly increasing understanding of the world. Seeing him grow and develop a personality gives me some window into what my father knew of me.
2) I’ve always kind of harbored some probably unwarranted almost certainly unhealthy animosity against my father for dying and leaving my mom and I alone. Those unresolved issues have always been one of the biggest motivators for me, at least internally, for being the best father I can be. I’ve been viewing this day as sort of a finish line, like hey I beat his record, when really it’s anything but. Taking care of myself and being around to grow old with my family feels even more important now as I begin to understand the scope of how little time my dad had with his family.