Choices

Clearly I am not yet ready to watch movies in which the father dies and the mother is left alone because her two children have grown up and flown the coop. Yeah. I like the bit where the father tries to relate to his son who is too busy wrapped up in his music and thoughts and life to really pay attention to what his dad is trying to say to him. Awesome.

One of the last times I saw my dad we had a sandwich on the balcony. I had already eaten something, but he made me a tuna sandwich and I didn't want to be rude and how often, at 31, does your dad make you a sandwich anyways? Yep. We talked about Afghanistan and the poppy fields and the warlords and what a fucked up mess it all was. I can't say that I didn't have some good conversations with my dad.

He left this note on my car over four years ago when I was working at Maersk. See, there was a steel yard or something just down the road from my office in Delta and he must have driven past my building, realized that was where I worked, seen my 1987 Supra (fun, fun car but damned expensive to maintain) in the parking lot and then left this on my windshield.

I remember coming out from the office at work that day and it was starting to rain so the note was starting to get a bit damaged. I took it. Put it in my photo album.

So. These are the choices. I can continue to cry all night. And that's just me. I mean, how is my brother doing? My mom? His brother and sister? I'm not the only left behind here.

What's to cry about? My dad loved me. I have it in writing. I will never be sad because my dad didn't love me or that I didn't get to spend quality time with him. I'm sad because he's not here, in the immediate here and now.

Everything else is good.

Everything is else fan-fucking-tastic (I'm not being facetious here, for once).

So I will not cry all night. Instead I will put together a top five list, stay up past my bedtime, drink more wine, and listen to Daft Punk, because I can.