For My Dad

I wrote these back in 2002 to honor my Dad, who was killed in a highway construction accident by someone speeding in the construction zone. its pretty much freeform and stream-of-thought, so pardon lack of formality in punctuation and so on. :)

9/2

today is the ninth anniversary of the death of my Dad....almost hard to believe it has been so long. I still keep expecting him to walk around the corner or call or ask me to go buy hay with him. gods, he was such a trip! an old home-boy from Oklahoma with that twang accent. and tall! 6'8"-ish and a bit on the gawky side. he and my mom looked so cute together since she's so short. loved to watch them dance though. :)

my dad's main expression was "No Big Deal!" ~~ he rarely got ruffled about anything. he just went on and took care of it. he could take a car engine apart and put it back together and it would start right back up. he could fix all sorts of things. and he absolutely loved animals. he grew up with them all around since his dad was the state vet of Oklahoma. I'll never forget the day one of the horses was bleeding from his leg. I called for Dad and he took a look, said his usual "no big deal" and proceeded to bandage him up good as new. gods, did I admire him so much for that way of being! or the day my truck was making a funny noise. so dad and I took a spin and he immediately knew it was the carrier bearing. we went, got parts and he replaced it lickey-split. or the day I was crying and sad cos I didn't have my kids with me, and he held me and told me everything would be alright.

he loved my mom at first sight *smiles* and he came to love her children, and my children. wide, wide open heart he had. *laughs* at a memory of him introducing my mom as his "bride" to the cashier at Walmart! so easy-going he was with everyone...such a beautiful soul...

I miss him still. I love him always. And I will never forget him....

here's to you, Dad ~~ "NO BIG DEAL!"~~
*hugs and kisses and love*

9/3

trying to sleep, but insomnia is interfering....

thinking about my Dad still...really the only true one out of the 4 I've had...

remembers that day he died. mom and I used to work at the same place. out of the blue her boss came to me while I was working and just said to come with her to her office. I walk in and there's her other boss and they're both staring at me with serious faces. I just "knew", without them even saying anything. I asked if it was Dad, if he was dead. they confirmed it wondering how I could know, then asked if I wanted to tell my mom or if I wanted them to. so, I took on that weight and said I'd do it.

mom came in, and looked surprised at seeing me in her boss' office. everyone left and I sat her down. then knelt down in front of her and held her hands and looked at her, brown eyes to brown eyes, and said, "Mom, its bad. It's Dad. He's dead." no forewarning, just plain out cos I didn't think I could tell it any other way without breaking down. I'll never, ever forget the look on her face. like a little girl who'd lost her dearest love, her best friend. as if she'd been punched in the gut. like an angel who had just become lost. *tears in eyes* such utter hurt and loss.....

then it was all phone calls, and flying the family in, and telling others, and "arrangements", oh gods and telling my kids that Grandpa was gone and them crying over the phone...and always the hope that it wasn't him, maybe someone stole his wallet and all kinds of strange thoughts, and trying to keep my mom alive through that long dark night, just her and I weeping out in her front yard, and my mom saying over and over as she sobbed that she didn't want to live without him. and then his body taken to the funeral home and we go there, my mom, 2 brothers and I. and I'm freaking out because I'd never even been in a funeral home before. so we walk down the hall, around the corner and I glimpse his body just quickly....lying there. I started crying, oh god because it WAS him, and my youngest brother took me back a few steps, holding my hand. gathered what composure I could, because I would see him one last time...so went all the way into that barren room to see him lying there....cold, cold, all cut up from the autopsy. I touched one of his big hands and felt ice....not my dad. one leg was severed, but I couldn't bring myself to look at it under the sheet he was covered with. god, and the back of his head all cut open from the autopsy...wasn't it clear enough how he died that they had to do that to him?? and his chest too...a long cut down the middle *shudders*

then back out of that room of ice...and some mindless numbing discussion about coffins...which did we want? well, heck....which would he fit in? he was sooo tall... and it was him after all and it was real as it gets and I wish I could tell him that I loved him...cos I didn't see him before he went to work that day....so couldn't tell him....and the tears rain down....cos then the trip to Oklahoma to bury him. and the church and the Freemasons, and folks with words of condolence, but I couldn't stop crying and I felt so damned numb. but hopefully he knows that I did love him and I will always consider myself his eldest daughter....

one time....and it was a big deal....smiles wanly through the tears...he'd kick my ass for crying *grin*...and even now he tells me he's here....but I still miss his big ole arms holding me in my deepest despair....his laugh, his dang hearing aids that he hated and always turned down then he couldn't hear you talking to him so you had to remind him by poking him, his big steel-toed boots and the way his clothes always had burn holes from welding things, the smell of oil and hydaulic fluid about him, his grey hairs, his laughing eyes, the way he married my mom in 3 separate ceremonies cos he loved her so much, his boots and my daughter's shoes sticking out from some car he was working on while she watched, him holding my son upside down with one hand laughing the entire time both of them...everything about him was and still is so precious...

and once in a while we go up there to Oklahoma, to his gravesite...and we leave him popcorn cos that was his favorite snack, and flowers and feathers and such...and there on that red stone marking sudden death and a life that was oh so bright, right under the Freemason symbol, it says, "No Big Deal" .....

~~ Cail