I tried really hard to fill my day today, I went to the bank, I planned on answering emails and doing washing and going food shopping. I was going to catch up on reading and work. But the world is funny sometimes, it doesn’t always allow you to do what you want to do. In my quest to fill my time I decided to walk home, down along by the riverside in Richmond. But my sense of direction is terrible and completely lost, I found myself walking by all these park benches that line the side of the river. Each one is dedicated to the memory of someone who has gone before, they hold beautiful messages of lives lived and loves lost. And so in spite of my plan to ignore what day it actually is today, I sat on a bench and remembered that this day last year we said our final goodbye to my dad.
As I sat, I watched another dad play with his toddler, a wobbler really, a new little human trying to find his feet. I watched the dad watch him, as he climbed up steps and wobbled down tiny mounds and it reminded me of what dads do. They let you try things, they let you be adventurous, they let you fail, they let you fall, because they know they will always be there to catch you, no matter what. I got the bus to school when I was in primary school and my dad, at my insistence would hide up a little hill, behind a tree and watch as the bus collected me. He did this because I was too embarrassed to have him stand beside me, but he watched me from afar, knowing I was safe but letting me be who I needed to be. And this is what he did, he watched, he steered but never imposed. He never had to, we knew what he thought, he was our family’s due north, our constant. In my line of work, we talk about trail blazers all the time, the Martin Luther Kings and Malala’s of this world, it makes for inspiring communications. But so often we forget about the ordinary people who through their everyday lives do extraordinary things. One of the benches by the river remembers a man who ‘spent many happy times walking this path’ and so today I remember the man who walked the path of life before me and with me, who taught us all how to walk properly, to know right from wrong, to love with no limitations, to stand up and be counted. My dad treated everybody with respect, to him doing the right thing was always more important than personal gain. He didn’t give great abounding lectures or write books about justice, but he lived his life with integrity, people looked to him when they were in trouble and he always stood up for what was right. I could read a thousand books about justice and equality, but you cannot learn from books what our father taught us. We watched how he and my mother lived, their unconditional love for each other and for us and it has shaped our lives and the people we have become.
But I find it hard to talk about my dad, even writing this is extremely difficult. Some of my family do a much better job of telling stories and remembering times together. I can’t, it is too painful for me to do that, for others it brings comfort. I don’t believe there is any one right way to grieve, that the person who talks or cries is grieving any worse or any better than the person who says nothing. Anyone who has ever lost someone they love knows that there is no formula to grief, no right way. People say the first of everything is the worst, the first Christmas, the first anniversary but every day is another day without that person. Every day is a day further away from when they were here, from when you last spoke, or joked, from the last time they held your hand or winked at you about a secret only you both knew. Every day could be a day you sit on a bench by the river and feel a pain so deep within you it takes your breath away.
But today I want to remember my dad, to let the pain out a little bit so I can take in the good of who he was, so I can let myself feel his presence, like he is still watching me from the hill. Like he is still letting me fall and fail because his memory will always catch me and guide me. Today, for a little while I will let myself remember that everything he did in his life was for us, for my mum and my brothers and sister. Today I will remember that a life well lived, is a life spent in love, expending yourself for others, gently loving, never foreboding. Today I remember my daddy.
ilooktothehills 