A family that I do not know is now occupying my childhood home. This bothers me more then I liked to admit. They moved in during early May just two weeks after purchasing it.
Aaron, the kids, and I will be in Chicago on June 5th. The thought that we will not be driving down the familiar tree lined streets of my youth, over the rickety wooden bridge in Hinsdale, past Spring Rock Park, past the place that was once Hippie Hills and is now a hideous townhome development, before parking in front of my sturdy brick house that my dad spent years remodeling, depresses me. I don't like being depressed. I am more of the type to shove it all down and try hard to think of rainbows as opposed to the dark stuff. I am a little annoyed with cancer right now. I just want my dad back. I am starting to feel like his death is total bull shit.
After my dad died it was hard going home. Everything seemed outplace. There were no crossword puzzle books placed on the ottoman near his comfy TV chair, he wasn't sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of tea waiting to greet me back home, and his garage full of tools was eerily empty. Every visit home since he passed, there was moment in which I would forget that he was gone. For a second, a minute even, I would expect to see him emerge from his upstairs bedroom, or hear his van pulling up the drive. Even though he is long gone it was comforting that his memory was still in that house. He wasn't there but it felt like he was.
For some reason the idea that my childhood home is gone makes my dad's death real. I have had a year in a half to accept his death. Still it is hard to fathom that I don't get to call him up on the phone or sit in the living room of my childhood home with him anymore.
As much as I try to rationalize what happened him, to convince myself that there was a reason behind his sickness, that it all part of god's plan for our family, I can't help but feeling angry. I have moments of complete peace over his passing but there are other times where I am heavy with rage. I miss him at random moments like during my neighbor's son’s birthday party where his father kneeled down and tied the shoe of 5 year old Eli, or when we attend my best friend’s family functions and both sets of grandfathers are there, proud and loving on the little people in their lives. On my Birthday I miss his voice, and the funny little pictures he would draw on the kid's birthday cards. I miss his dumb jokes and gentle presence.
I don’t think I have given myself the chance to miss him. I try to remind myself how blessed I am. I am so very blessed to have had him as a father. Some people never have the opportunity to know their fathers, or worse they have a terrible one. I had a great dad, and I got to be his daughter for 29 years. I have no right to complain.
In 10 days I will be confronted with the idea that he is really gone. I have a feeling that arriving at my aunt’s home from the airport will be harder than dad’s funeral. The house is gone; his garage where he spent countless hours building and creating things is now, more likely than not, occupied by a minivan and bikes with training wheels. The shelves are no longer lined with jam jars housing various nails and other carpentry tools. A different man and woman are sleeping in my parent’s upstairs bedroom and their young children have taken over our other bedrooms. I wonder if they will love that house the same way we did. I will be south of Chicago instead of west, and everything will feel ass backwards. The whole thing makes me feel sad.
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