11-04-2014
As I get a little older I begin to take a different look at
things. I lost my father 30 years ago
when he was at the age I am now. I was
23.
I remember being the person who would always conform to the
environment in which I lived. I didn’t
step too far from the societal box that defined me; confined me.
I know I am not alone.
Whether you have lost a parent or not, you have that moment in your life
when you ask yourself the questions: “What the heck am I doing?” and “Is this
all there is?”
The hardest part for me was looking at the beliefs of my parents and realizing that I could no longer subscribe to them. They didn’t fit; not for me. And the strange thing was…is that I realized that they didn’t fit when I was much younger. It was around my 11th birthday (1971) when something inside was speaking to me through the truth that I had already been taught. A single scripture tore the veil revealing a light that I had seen before, but heretofore had not recognized. A light that was so bright, that even though it illuminated a path, it initially blinded me, causing me to stumble for years until my feet were finally, clearly, able to traverse the path. It was that day that I realized the truth about God. Not your truth. Not the church’s truth. Not the Priest’s or the Pastor’s truth. My truth; hand delivered with words of wisdom from many centuries past. And just to be clear…I hold My truth as dearly as I respect and honor yours!
Skip ahead to October 8th, 1984, the angriest, saddest, yet, as I have now had time to put it all in perspective, the happiest day of my life. And it was all for the same reason. It was the day that my father traded in the physical for the spiritual. I didn’t understand the flood of different emotions that rushed through me, but while I was suffering immeasurable grief and pain the seed of understanding was germinating within my soul. And while I still feel happiness, sadness, and anger, I now know why! What I thought was a random series of events in my life suddenly began to take shape onto a beautiful canvas that is now the picture of my life.
And today, November 4, 2014, I celebrate the life, and rekindle the memories, of the man I simply refer to as Dad.
Still Loved; Still Missed, and Still with me.
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