Friday, January 24, 2014

Five Minute Friday: Visiting with My Dad

For this week's Five Minute Friday, I found someone who loves Five Minute Friday as much as me! I'm linking up with Lisa Jo and her Five Minute Friday Post topic: Visit. If you like to write and want something quick and fun to do, you should check out her blog! Every Friday she posts a Five Minute Friday topic, you write for five minutes, share your writing, and can read other writers' five minute musings too! It's really fun!



Five Minute Friday


Here's what I wrote on the prompt Visit:



I never knew how I should feel about visiting my dad at the cemetery. At first I would go and sit by his gravestone with the view of the pond, talk to him about my day, laugh about how much the geese loved to leave him presents on his stone, and just sit.

At first, it made me feel connected to him in some way—like when I went to the cemetery, I was visiting him. Sometimes, it made me sad to think of my dad like this—buried in the ground, in a place where I would never see his face again. It would bring me flashbacks of his funeral. The rain poured down like cold stones as we ran from the car to the tent at his grave-site. It rained on his wedding day.

But this is no longer my reality. Going to the cemetery is just a quick stop to say hello. It’s just a minute to walk around peacefully, looking at the beautiful trees and that pond with the silly geese. Maybe it’s bringing my dad flowers; maybe it’s just looking at the beautiful headstone.

I don’t go that often anymore. I feel connected to my dad every day. I feel him everywhere. I feel him in my laugh. I see him in my youngest sister’s smile and the squint of her eyes. I see his likeness in my middle sister’s eyes and the color of her skin. I feel him in the craziness of life when his voice whispers in my head that everything will be alright. I dream of his hugs. I feel him in my heart every day. I love having a place to visit if I want to, but I don’t need to anymore. I know that he is with me every second of every day. I like that. I’m better with that.





2 comments:

  1. Joy here from Five-Minute-Friday. I'm sorry that your dad is at the cemetery. That must be really tough. Usually when I come to post on other FMF posts I can think of something to say that doesn't sound silly, trite, or inappropriate, but I'm not sure how to respond to this post other than to thank you for having the courage to write about something that is evidently very real to you. So thank you. Hope you come back again next week.

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    1. Joy, thank you for your kind words. It is much appreciated. It has been a lot of years of processing the loss of my dad, but I'm in a good place now. Thank you again. I definitely will be back next week.

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