October 3, 2024
279 Days Without You
Hi Dad,
Yesterday was my birthday, the first one without you. I had been nervous about it for weeks because I didn’t know how I would feel. That seems to be the story of my life recently—never knowing how I’ll feel. I didn’t know if I would miss you or if I would only remember back to my last birthday when you and mom stayed in Carter and I’s one bedroom apartment for the weekend. Mom and I went to the farmer’s market while you and Carter stayed back to watch football. You were quiet all weekend, and I could tell you were getting weaker. You had this far off look in your eye, like you could never quite focus on me for more than a few seconds at a time.
That Saturday night you had an accident in the bed, and I will never forget mom waking me up to ask for a change of sheets. You looked at me from the bedroom door. I couldn’t read your expression. Ashamed or embarrassed maybe, but you never said a word. You were already slipping away by then.
This year I took the day off from work on my birthday. I drank good coffee, went to Barnes and Noble (our favorite store), and went over to Mom’s for dinner and a fire. All six of us were there. We sat around the fire and roasted marshmallows until everyone had to leave to go to bed. I realized I didn’t blow out any candles on my birthday, but maybe that’s okay. We all know what I would wish for if I could.
I was glad the day went well. I felt special and loved, and I didn’t cry once (which is a big deal for me). So today, the day after my birthday, I thought I would be fine. But I was a wreck tonight, Dad. I cried in bed until I couldn’t catch my breath. I cried until my cheeks cracked with dried tears and I had blown through a box of tissues. I felt like I was under attack, like all of the emotions I was worried I would feel on my birthday came bursting through the surface all at once. Carter sat beside me and rubbed my back while I cried with my whole body. (You’d be proud of the man he’s turning into, Dad. I know you loved him like your own, and he has been handling everything with such compassion and gentleness.)
My therapist tells me that emotions are like waves. They wave in and may feel all-consuming, but they will always wave back out. If regular emotions were waves, I think my emotions tonight must have been a hurricane. I was suddenly so angry that I get to turn another year older and you don’t. I get to turn 23 and 24 and 25 and all of these ages (God willing), but you will always be 54. You will never have another birthday bundt cake, and you will never get to make another wish and blow out the birthday candles. We will never get to put party hats on you again or throw surprise parties or sing “Happy Birthday” to you. I know that nothing in this world is fair, and that’s just life. But this just doesn’t seem right. It doesn’t seem right to have to spend the rest of my birthdays without you, missing you, feeling your absence and wishing I could turn back time to feel you near.
Dad, I’ve never been scared to get older, but this year, and I’m nervous to admit it, but turning one year old scares me. Getting older scares me because you know, you knew, me as 22-year-old Claire. Claire the college student, the newly-wed, the apprentice. But I’m not her anymore, Dad. I’m only one year older, but I have changed so much in so little time. I’ve been married for a whole year, and I graduated college. I got a full-time job and Carter and I moved. I’m grieving and growing and learning. I’m 23 now, a whole year older than what you know me as.
It makes me sad to think you’ll only ever know me as the 22-year-old version of myself, and it makes me scared to grow older and farther away from that version. If I’ve already changed and grown so much in just one year, who will I be in five or ten? Will I still be the same person who you celebrated 22 birthdays with? The person who you had the most special father-daughter bond with, who you always just seemed to get. The same person who cried to you about not being ready to not have a dad anymore and who wept on your shoulder in your hospice bed. Will I still be the person you knew? If not, then I’m not sure I want to grow any older, not if it takes me farther from you.
I don’t know what it’s like in Heaven and if you’re actually seeing me from up there, if you’re watching me slowly turn into a different, older person with new experience and perspectives. I think you would be proud of who I am today—the 23-year-old me—because I know you were proud of the 22-year-old me and the 21-year-old me and every age I’ve been to this point. I think you might be most proud of the 23-year-old me because I survived this past year (barely, but I did). This year was hell, Dad. I can only hope it goes up from here, but it’s hard to believe things will get better without you. Even though my 22nd year on this earth was a living nightmare, I’m going to miss it, because it was the last year I had you.
