Well today is April 25th...
If you have lost someone special in your life dates take on different significance.
Your wedding date becomes a joy-filled celebration that you share with your partner...or a day you take off work and drink yourself silly telling yourself you are totally over them anyways and hardly even care they took off three years ago.
And today would have been my parents 61st wedding anniversary.
So all day I thought about my sweet Dad. He really would have been so damn proud of nurse Karen :)
He would NOT have wanted a big party for today...in fact, I am pretty sure he didn't really like being around my mother all that much. But I adored that man and miss him still.
When I dropped out of college, or got my heart destroyed, or was negotiating a new salary, he was always there. There wasn't a problem too big for him to listen, put his arm around me, and offer advice.
Four years ago, in preparation for April 25th, I learned how to play Tony Lane's "Learned that from you".
The very first time I heard this song I wondered if that had been how my mother had felt about my dad. Because for all his greatness he also was a horrible alcoholic who drank himself into a stupor nearly every evening. I am sure it is one the reasons I hate being drunk. Nighttime Dad was a totally different man than Daytime Daddy.
Unlike the woman in the song, my mother stayed in her marriage. She wasn't strong enough to face life without him...and though I don't fault her for her choices, I have spent a few nights thinking about how her life would have been had she stood up to him.
Today I called my mother...like I always do on these special days so full of memories for me...but I didn't bring up the date or the significance. As each year passes, she talks of him less and less, and I didn't want to make her sad if she hadn't thought of her wedding day all those years ago. The conversation ended with no mention of it, and maybe that is better for her.
But tonight I am filling my head with memories of all the best of my dad...he was the greatest cheer leading section I have ever had and I'll light a candle and try my best to go to sleep with a smile.
