While I still miss my dad, Father's Day continues to get better
It was June 1982. My father had died less than two months earlier, at the tender age of fifty-seven. My thirtieth birthday was on the eleventh of the month. I was having dinner that night with my mother and my youngest brother. There wasn't much of a celebration. We were sad over someone who should have been there with us.
A week later was Father's Day. It was the first without my dad. I can't remember what we did that day. I only know it was painful because of my family's loss.
That's how I continued to celebrate Father's Day for the rest of the decade. Throughout the rest of the 1980s, the third Sunday in June was just another day.
That changed early in the following decade. My oldest daughter was born in September of 1990. Her sister followed less than two years later. While it took them some time to understand the day's meaning, their arrival gave me a reason to celebrate the day once again.
It's now been more than thirty years since I started celebrating Father's Day as a father. Almost two years ago my youngest made me a grandfather. Another great reason to celebrate. Grandfathers get to celebrate Father's Day, right? DAMN, RIGHT!!! Plus, there's another one on the way this fall.
When I look at everything I have just written, my thoughts are how did I get so lucky? How is it I'm so blessed? What a difference life is compared to that June day in 1982.
So, while I'll spend some time today remembering and missing my own father, the focus will be on my current life and all the good things that are here...and all the good things to come. There's room in my heart for both.
Related Post: Happy Father's Day to my daughters
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