Monday, March 27, 2006
Grief
I'm in a morbid mood. Hearing about my friend K has sent my mind on a downward spiral. My father died about two months ago. It was drawn out and nasty after a car accident. Though he wasn't young, I would hope to be as fit and spry as him in my late 70's
Like most men I'd had a mixed relationship with my father. Its a right of passage to look at how your father lived his life, and how you where raised and find fault. In our youth we are invincibly convinced we will live life better. With age comes the realisation that better actually means different, and we hopefully find the things of strength and promise in our fathers to emulate.
Well, I did anyway. After the years of teenage agnst, and 20's wildness I came to value my father more and more. The relationship morphed and though the parental bond never truly breaks, we became friends as well.
I miss him.
It hits me at the oddest times. Yesterday I was walking along the South Bank, looking over at the Gurkin and thought about how I wanted to show it with him and discuss its merits and faults. We both have a love of architecture, and its a building I know he'd value. With the thought of walking along and talking with him, it hit with an ice cold jab that I'd never be able to do that again. I had a sudden urge to drop to my knees and cry.
Since the funeral, life has gone back to normal. I have my own children to raise, my own wife to love, my own job to consume me. Yet I so miss those long rambling email conversations, the phone calls and the ever precious visits. Intellectually I know time cools grief, and that I have the compensations of home, family and friends to fall back on. Yet right now, as I write this a tear is rolling down my cheek.
Like most men I'd had a mixed relationship with my father. Its a right of passage to look at how your father lived his life, and how you where raised and find fault. In our youth we are invincibly convinced we will live life better. With age comes the realisation that better actually means different, and we hopefully find the things of strength and promise in our fathers to emulate.
Well, I did anyway. After the years of teenage agnst, and 20's wildness I came to value my father more and more. The relationship morphed and though the parental bond never truly breaks, we became friends as well.
I miss him.
It hits me at the oddest times. Yesterday I was walking along the South Bank, looking over at the Gurkin and thought about how I wanted to show it with him and discuss its merits and faults. We both have a love of architecture, and its a building I know he'd value. With the thought of walking along and talking with him, it hit with an ice cold jab that I'd never be able to do that again. I had a sudden urge to drop to my knees and cry.
Since the funeral, life has gone back to normal. I have my own children to raise, my own wife to love, my own job to consume me. Yet I so miss those long rambling email conversations, the phone calls and the ever precious visits. Intellectually I know time cools grief, and that I have the compensations of home, family and friends to fall back on. Yet right now, as I write this a tear is rolling down my cheek.
