A Sense of Doubt blog post #3859 - Letter to Dad #001 for Thursday September 11th

A Sense of Doubt blog post #3859 - Letter to Dad #001 for Thursday September 11th


Hi Dad (Big Guy), 

Two weeks ago was the one-year anniversary of your death. I was not ready to write about you and that year of grieving yet when I reached the day.

I am ready now.

Before I dive in, I should acknowledge that today is September 11th and the 24th anniversary of the terrorist attack that killed so many at the World Trade Center and on the other planes. My heart is always with all those who died and the survivors and all the families. Of course. But today, for me at least, is about something else.

I conceived this feature that I am going to run every Thursday because the one year anniversary fell on Thursday this year. You died last year on Wednesday, August 28th at 13:40 EDT.

I am not fully prepared for today's missive, so I will keep it short.

What I need to do is prep next week's right away and start adding to it as I think of things. Probably also setting up future weeks so as not to dump all my thoughts in one week.

On the one year anniversary of your death I set an alarm for both the actual time of your death, which is 10:40 a.m. my time, but then also for the time by numbers, 13:30 PDT, which is what I use for both yours and Mom's death times.

I published all of the blog posts for August 25th - 31st at the time of your death, 13:40.

And the day after the anniversary of your death, I spent a nice day in Portland.

I don't like the word "anniversary" for the one-year mark since you died. An anniversary is something we celebrate. I didn't celebrate. I acknowledged.

Even though I know that what lies beyond feels more like home than this mortal realm, that it is a place of pure love. So in that sense, it is something that should be and could be celebrated.

But I miss you (and MOM) too much to celebrate.

So, in the spirit of keeping this short, one other thing and then I will sign off.

Every night at bed time I tell Ellory (my eight year old lab puppy) what I call the NUMBERS, a series of things meant to quell her anxieties as she has a lot of anxiety.

For a year now, ever since I returned home here from being with you as you died and then helping with the memorial service, as part of the fourth and final number about how many people love her, I tell Ellory about how much you loved her and how much she loved you, how I think about you and Mom all the time and will remind her of them every night. She never knew Mom given that we adopted her over a year after Mom died. But she knew and loved you, and you loved her.

Remember how excited she was to see you when you visited in 2022?

Remember how I foolishly did a practice before our move out west and gave you Ellory even though she was not yet a year old and you were 82 at the time? And you fell over with her, into the weeds along the parkway trail. Thankfully, you were not hurt.

Ellory loved to take a nap with you as she did here on our drive west. Her loves you.

I do, too.

More next week dad, Big Guy.

Love,

Christopher

This picture is from August 25, 2017, almost exactly eight years before you took your last breath.

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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2509.11 - 10:10

- Days ago: MOM = 3724 days ago & DAD = 378 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I post Hey Mom blog entries on special occasions. I post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day, and now I have a second count for Days since my Dad died on August 28, 2024. I am now in the same time zone as Google! So, when I post at 10:10 a.m. PDT to coincide with the time of Mom's death, I am now actually posting late, so it's really 1:10 p.m. EDT. But I will continue to use the time stamp of 10:10 a.m. to remember the time of her death and sometimes 13:40 EDT for the time of Dad's death. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.