Dad
I just wanted you to know that I miss you so very much, and I still love you with everything I have. I am so confused and scared. I feel betrayed and sad. I can’t help but to cry. I keep hearing your voice in my head, seeing your facial expressions. I can’t stop remembering things. It’s been 19 days since they say you died and 16 since I found out. I never thought I could feel pain like this…ever. For the most part, some days I am doing okay. Though, it’s hard to be happy and go back to normal when I know that it was you who pulled the trigger. I just want to know why? I know you left a note, and I know what it says.
Nate asks about you, all the time. He prays for you at night. Well, we make a list of people he wants to dream about and you’re always on that list. There are so many people who love you, I just don’t understand why you didn’t ask one of us for help. I mean, really ask. I could have let you move in with me, and I could have got a ground floor apartment that would have been easy for you to go in and out of. I could have bought your cigars and anything else you would have needed.
I am not okay. It doesn’t matter how many times I say that I am… I am not. I call your phone to hear your voicemail all the time. I know it’s not healthy, but I miss you. I just want to hug you, then yell at you for being so foolish. I want to know that you are alright, and I want to talk to you again. I want to hear you play your guitar to the radio on a hot summer night when there is nothing else to do to escape from the heat. I want to come up and visit you by that pond, or have a drink with you at the lodge. I want so much to have you back, and it kills me to know that nothing I do will make that possible.
I know you love me, I know you do. Though, when you left this way, it feels like nothing I ever did mattered. It feels like I didn’t matter. I shouldn’t think like that but I am. I can’t help it, my emotions are all crazy and I don’t know how I am supposed to feel. I want to scream until I can’t breathe. I want to run until I can’t feel…and I really really want to just lie in my bed and cry all day.
I am a mess, I quit my job because I couldn’t go in there and not think about you. I told everyone that I got fired, I probably shouldn’t lie. Though I don’t want to hear it. I am dying inside and I have no one to talk to. You were the one I always talked to about these things, I always called you to make me happy. I hoped that I could return the sentiment and make you feel good when you were otherwise not. I have never had a hole so large in my chest before and I feel as though I am going to explode from the anguish. If it weren’t for Nate, I would not be able to go on.
At first I was so angry with you. I wanted to yell and scream at you, though I know that’s not how you would be. I was always so much like you, able to see things from both sides. I just wish it didn’t have to end this way. I miss you, and it may be for selfish reasons, but I wanted you to walk me down the isle. I wanted you to be there for my children I am going to have. I wanted you to teach Nate how to ride horses, and I wanted to learn more from you about the wilderness and guns. I wanted you to teach me everything you knew so that one day I could be half the person you were. Everyone keeps saying what a great guy you were and how it is a terrible loss… if so many people loved you then why did you leave? Why did you leave me? Why did you leave Chelsea, Bridger, Dani, and Nate? My heart is broken into a million little pieces and you’re the only one who could have fixed it.
I do little things to distract myself. I swim at Chelsea’s house. I play games on my computer, watch movies with Nate. Though it’s very difficult for me to tell him bedtime stories without crying, that was our thing. You always read to me. Nate and I are working on the alphabet, and you’re the one who taught me that, I get to “L” and then I start crying.
Chelsea told me this story today about how she was in walmart and this little girl was sitting with her father rubbing her cheek on his hand…it made me miss you so much. She said she cried. When I was little and it was just us, we would go to Subway, and watch Sesame Street, and Thomas the Tank Engine. We would sit at the kitchen counter and play on that learning video game. Socrates, I think it was called. I remember how you always would tell me how beautiful I was when you saw me, and even if I didn’t feel very beautiful that day, it always made me feel better.
The last time I saw you, we were talking about my hair and how long it has been getting. We talked about how Nate was forming actual sentences that people could understand and how awesome that was. If I would have known that would be the last time, I would have taken more care to make it more special. I would have hugged you longer, and not rushed to get home and put Nate to bed. I would have answered the phone that Wednesday when you called. I ignored it because I was getting ready for work. I feel so awful about that. I didn’t even listen to the whole message. I deleted it after I heard you say there was stuff in the back of the car for me because I was going to call you on my lunch break, though I never did.
I remember how I used to take Nate to the lodge to see you, and the winter before last how you were teaching him how to make snow angels in the parking lot. How he face planted off the picnic table onto the rocks and ice, got up and laughed. I remember so much about you, but I can’t make it okay. I can’t just think like I did with Grandpa and Gran, that remembering you will make me feel better. It doesn’t, you were so young. 57 is not that old, you had so much life left. You always said when you left this world a great sigh would pass over the land, I used to just laugh. Though that Wednesday, in the middle of my work shift, I was overcome by an unknown wave of sorrow that lasted until that Saturday when I finally understood what my mind was trying to tell me. I have wept so much over this, and it is so hard to stay strong when I love you so much. I miss you more with every passing breath and it doesn’t get any easier. They say that time will heal, though I don’t think it will in this case.
I need to go to put Nate back in bed, but I thought I would let you know what is on my mind. Also, Nate keeps asking for you. I don’t know what I am supposed to tell him, so I just say that Papa with his Mommy, Daddy, and Step-Dad and we won’t see him for a very long time. Is that what I am supposed to say? I need you so badly, and I know there is no way to reach you. So I just wanted to let you know, that I will always love you more than anything. You always meant the world to me, always. Even if I didn’t show it as much as I could have.
I love you, dad.
Love,
Me
