On My Own

When I was a child my mother was always gone; never home. So for the first 7 months of my life, I was cared for by my dad. Although, when my sister was born, my mother stayed home more often to help with the both of us. But as soon as I could walk and talk, I claimed my dad as my best friend. He is the one who taught me how to do those things, after all.
He’d brush my hair in the mornings for school. He’d help me brush my teeth. He’d tuck me in at night, and tell me my favorite stories to fall asleep to. Eventually, I could read and write on my own. I could put my hair into a ponytail (although, not a very good one) on my own. I could even brush my teeth, on my own.
I remember one morning, before school, he let me do my own hair. I had it going all different directions with tons of little clips and pretties in it. I looked so ridiculous, but I was proud of myself; and so was my dad. Speaking of looking ridiculous, on Halloween one year, my princess of a sister didn’t want to do anything, but I did. So my dad and I went out to trick-or-treat while my mother stayed with my little sister.
Being young, my only worries were when I fell down, or couldn’t figure out how to tie my shoes. But in later years, times got rough. The economy had gotten so bad that my dad lost his job, and my mother was close behind. With two kids to support, life began to get extremely stressful for him and my mother. Even though I was 13, there were no more tuck-ins at night. There were only “don’t forget to brush your teeth”. Some nights, I would hear him and my mother argue. It was almost always about my sister and me.
One night, while I was eavesdropping, I heard my dad tell my mother that he was trying to get into the ARMY. I didn’t realize what that included, but later that year he explained it all to me. He explained how he was going to be deployed to serve in the Iraqi war.
I cried, and begged him not to go. I told him I’d get a job, and I could help. He didn’t have to do it this way. The day after he left, and the two months after, I cooped myself up into my room and cried more then I breathed. Things barely got better with time.
10 months had gone successfully by. But one night, while I was reading over the letter I was going to send out, making sure I’d written “I-love-you” at least 500 times, I got a call from my mother. She discussed what had happened to my dad. She had said that he was caught up in the wrong spot at the wrong time, and we needed to start planning for a funeral.
So here I am before you all at my dad’s funeral, enlightening you about my relationship with my dad and how much he meant to me…on my own.