About not getting 'the call'...

Every Christmas for the last 10-15 years, I would dread 'the call' from my dad.  It felt obligatory on his part, he seemed uncomfortable, there was nothing to talk about, as in NOTHING.  We had no idea what the other's life was about.  The call would be short and mostly made up of how he only had so many minutes on his calling card.   It was dreadful, I loved it and hated it and wanted so much more.  The disappointment was agony.   Craig always waited for me to collapse in a stormy, tearful, heap in his comforting arms.   The grief would pass and I would forget until the next Christmas.   We would see each other for short periods a couple times a year when I visited family in Idaho.  It was not very satisfactory, but not so brutal in exposing what 'wasn't'.   

Dad died last spring.  Divine providence provided perfect timing for me to be there.  We gave and received all the love we had somehow missed with each other.  It was short, intensely sweet, real and then over.  I saw and felt and heard our love.   It was there after all, buried.

What was amazing, but also hurt so much is that there was this whole circle of people who showed up at the hospital that had parts of my daddy that I never had, maybe when I was young, but not for years and years.  They loved him and he was a huge part of their lives and they obviously felt incredibly loved by him.  It was weird and surreal, like they knew someone I didn't, and I felt robbed!   Angry!  Hated them!   Wanted them gone, so I could have some last crumbs.  What I realized was that there was enough to go around.  I had to come to this, because they stayed and wouldn't leave.   I started being thankful to see this man through their eyes.  To hear their stories of him.  My sadness and memories mixed with their tears and stories made the air he was gulping with his last breaths sweet, I hope.  I didn't get a call from him, from my dad this year.   Didn't have anything to dread.