My Hero

I was fortunate enough to have a great Father, not perfect but great as in he taught me well. He taught me great music. He taught me great stories. He taught me how to work with my hands and too put in an honest days labor. But most of all he taught me how to love myself by loving his family in such a way that when I think back on it now it brings a tear to my eye. He gave of himself not just when needed but every moment of every day, making sure we all had what we needed to get by. We were not rich by any means but we were very happy. I hear so many stories of people who could not relate to their parents and I never have anything to add to the conversation because I never knew what that was like, of course I like many kids didn't always get them or they me. But we laughed so much, all the time. They were so much fun.

My Father lived simply and with little money that made it easy, but he never went into debt for anything but a home. Buying very used cars was how he taught me to work with my hands and to live within my means, (too bad that din't seem to take. Ugh). Always making the best of what he had and by giving to whoever needed more than he. His heart was massive and he made sure everyone he cared about knew how much he loved them. Either by saying it or by showing it, we all knew...

In 2010 our family lost a nephew to a cancer called Ewing's Sarcoma, Adam had just turned 18 a week earlier. Adulthood had been dangled on front of him only to be ripped away, (but that is a whole other story). He had been fighting it since the age of 15 never complaining, never feeling sorry for himself. Again traits that he learned from my father, doing his best to look to the positive. But this loss took so much out of my family, especially my parents. But then just a few years later my Father was diagnosed with Renal cancer, smoking non-filtered Lucky Strikes his whole life had finally caught up with him. In September of 2013 thinking that he had pulled something in his back moving a bird bath for his mother, he visited a chiropractor and he was the one that had found it in x-rays. To be positive he had sent him to a specialist who did a PET scan, his entire body lit up like a Christmas tree. If you've been in that position then you know the out come, he was stage four. Fuck.

The family carried on with the mundane everyday things that still had to be done while his civil war with that shitty disease ragged on. cancer is indifferent to all, careless yet meticulous in its design it's pathological persistence in destroying every organ it comes across with no remorse, no guilt. While all any of its victims can do is watch helplessly as their loved one is slowly eaten away. My wife at the time and I were in Chicago for her annual Christmas party when I had gotten a phone call to come home as soon as possible, they had moved him to hospice. Double fuck.

Two days later my father let go, holding his hand as he took his last breath I watched as his skin lost all color while his heart slowly stopped, my tears falling onto his hand and my mother embracing him, the man she had called her husband and friend for four decades had gone. He had only been diagnosed in September. It was a lot to process and too much to take in, taking a heavy toll on all of us. My marriage at the time ended just a year later.

As a family you move on, well... you try. But everything has been torn apart, changed. A piece of you ripped away without permission, your security and mind violated. And between those two losses we had lost other family members as well adding to the sting of it all. But for four decades we had a lot of laughter and with the addition of grandchildren we will have a lot more.

Ironically his appointments had been scheduled by someone I had lost contact with, a young lady I had dated in school. And thanks to my father we had been reunited and are now married, laughing just as much as I used too with someone I should have never lost in the first place. I owe you one Dad and I'll see you again, Peace.

Fuck cancer it does not deserve to be capitalized...

And everything happens for a reason.