Personal blog by @poeticsnake.
Three days ago my mom came to visit me together with her youngest brother, my uncle. While we met up for a fun time we had also something very serious to spend time on, my father.
Since the moment he died, June 1 this year, the grief hits me in waves and I allow them to be there.
10 weeks have passed and I have been through many emotional roller coasters. Time will heal all wounds but some kinds of pain are harder to work with. While I don't run away from my grief I noticed that it seriously effects my life. At times I can't concentrate or sleep, just to name a few. Till this weekend it kinda felt not real. If that is even the right way to describe it seeing I am and have been rather sure it is and was all real.
Three days ago my mom handed me a little jar with some ashes of my Dad. The feelings inside me took total control and I lost it. I cried, I screamed and I was happy at the same time that I had something of him, my dad, the man who always made me smile. It was as if it all became real at that moment. That I would never be able to talk to him again, to hear him laugh, to see him struggle with his keys, to hold his hand. While I already knew all those things it hit me like lightning and slammed me off my feet.
For weeks I have been searching for a perfect box to keep my fathers ashes in but I could not find it. So for now I am using this little treasure box until I finally find what I am looking for. It feels weird and good at the same time to see this box standing on my cabinet. Every morning I hold it up and push it against my chest, wishing my my dad a good morning before I make coffee.
At times I feel guilty for being glad that he no longer needs to struggle with his health and body anymore but at the same time it makes me feel like I am glad that he died. Every time I tell someone that I am glad he no longer is in pain I bite my tongue or inner cheek. I know that they understand what I mean with my words but for some reason it pains me still to say them. I would have given both my hands to keep him with us just a tad longer. But how selfish that would have been. To not let him go, to let him be free. To keep him a prisoner in his own body. Now his soul is free and I do believe that he went all the up and collected his wings.
To realize what stays behind when a person died, the ashes that remain on the planet after a cremation.... It amazes me how many emotions it can bring. I held my dads ashes in my hand. I moved it around on my palm. Little fragments of bone, fragments of what once was my dads body on my own hand. Ashes, nothing but ashes. Nothing flesh, nothing alive, just ashes. So light it could be picked up with the wind and blow across the fields.
My mom kept a bit of the ash as well and most of it has been spread across a huge tree on a grassy field where also other family members got their last resting place.
My dad once asked me what I would like to have when he would die. I shook my head and told him that he should never worry about something like that. I have no need for money, nor do I want to have other items. However, I smiled at that moment, I told him there was one item that would really mean something to me. His wedding ring!
I had totally forgotten about that talk until my mom handed me a small box with his ring inside. Again I was hit by emotions and my tears created a river. I know wear his wedding ring around my neck. It's a heavy ring so I feel it all the time. It reminds me of his love for my mom and me. The reason a ring, his ring, means so much to me is because it's the one item that he always had on him. Even when he was get sick and his fingers started to pain him. At the end he could no longer wear it but he kept it close.
Grief, it hits me in waves and I allow them to roll into my life and ground me when need be. Grief is not always a bad feeling. In this case my grief reminds me of the love we shared, the fun we had and how thankful I am that I could spend 38 years of my life with this wonderful man! Thankful for all the times he made me laugh and cry at the same time. Thankful for all his wise words who are forever written in the handbook of my life!
Grief, today I cry a river of pain with a smile written on my heart!
