Contemplations on the Anniversary of My Father's Passing

Today is the first anniversary of my father’s passage (though this being a leap year, the one year mark was technically passed yesterday).  The occasion of this anniversary gives me pause to contemplate the whole of my experiences with his illness and death and our family’s grieving process.

It should be clear from the existence of this blog that my father and I were close.  Furthermore, the contents of many of the blog entries make it clear that I consider him a hero, worthy not only of emulation but also of a greater place than history will likely afford him.  He was very dear to me; that is no secret.

In consideration of these things, there are some aspects of his loss which my reader may find surprising, especially those readers not as devoutly Christian as I am.  I would like to mention three aspects of losing my father which run counter to our culture’s understanding of the thoughts and events that should surround the loss of a loved one.

1) There was a remarkable atmosphere at my father’s deathbed.  To be sure, there were many tears shed at my father’s bedside during those last thirteen days of his life when he was a resident of the Hospice of the Comforter.  Many family and friends knelt beside him, took his hand, and whispered their goodbyes.  Many tears were shed.  

Not knowing when he would go, those of us who visited him daily were forced to relive final goodbyes night after night.  By the end, I had mine memorized.  “Good night, dad,” I would say.  “You were a great father to me.  I’m glad you were my dad, and I love you.  If you’re here tomorrow, I will be here too.”  These things, the tears and goodbyes, fit our cultural stereotype of a deathbed scene.

What did not fit, however, was the festive atmosphere that sometimes lit the room.  For two weeks, my dad had the “party room” at the hospice.  A steady stream of people came and went and though frequently the mirth was mixed with tears, there was the sound of laughter and, indeed, even of song.  The rooms being quite well sound proofed, we were not a disturbance to the other residents, but the nurses knew that of all the heavy oak doors lining the hall, my dad’s was the one through which wafted the sounds of laughter, of singing, of guitar.  

On one Sunday morning, as we were singing in my father’s room, one of the nurses eased open the door.  “Do you mind if we leave this door open?” she inquired.  “The rest of us want to get some of the hallelujah too!”

My dad’s deathbed stands in contrast to another I saw during our time at the hospice.  I remember seeing another man in a nearby room, alone in his bed, pale, gaunt, oxygen masked… watching the Wall Street financial reports.

2) I have never been to my father’s grave.  By the time of the memorial service, my father’s body had already been interred.  There was no casket, no hearse, no pall-bearers.  There was no long line of headlight burning cars with police escort.  To my knowledge, no one went to the graveside after the service.

Since then, I have not yet made it to the grave site.  I would like to visit.  But it lies a good distance out of town, and I simply have not found the time to drive all the way out to that part of Florida.  

Some people, I suppose, would be aghast that I have not been to my father’s grave, but the part of my father that I am interested in, does not reside in the Florida National Cemetery.  It resides with God.  I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I’ve committed unto him against that day.

My father’s grave stands in contrast to the Hollywood portrayal of grave sites as places where the bereaved go to talk to their lost loved ones…a place where people grieve, year after year with no hope of real restoration.

3) My grief has not been as bad as I anticipated.  I suppose it helps that his passing was no surprise and that prior to his death his quality of life was greatly reduced.  It helps too that he reached his life expectancy.  As already stated, it helps also to know that he is with God.

However, I should like to explore, for a few sentences, another reason why my father’s death does not bring the grief one might expect.  That reason is that he was a remarkably good father.  

This may strike my reader as counter-intuitive.  If he was an exceptionally good father, why does that fact make him less missed?  Here is my answer:  Had my dad been a worse father, there would be unsettled hurts from the forty-two years he and I had together on this earth.  There are, in fact, no such hurts, no regrets, no unsettled issues.  I guess you could say that my father raised me to do fine without him.  I hope I can equip my son in the same way.

Though I do grieve his loss, my father’s relationship with me stands in contrast to that of many other people who will never settle the hurts of the past.

I guess the Apostle Paul summed it up pretty well.  “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”