NOV 19

Cactus! That's what I dream about this time of the year. -33 degrees Celsius, 2 feet of snow during the night & I dream of cactus. Not Christmas trees or mistletoe, succulents.
Christmas is a great time of the year. I love the decorations, the gift wrapping, hunting all day for that perfect something. I really do love it. At least I used. I'm trying to get the old feelings back, I'm trying hard. But too often now I get preoccupied. Now, the end of the year is a struggle for me. I get overcome with memories & emotions that I successfully keep in check the rest of the year. My dreams become chaotic, when I sleep at all. I find the ends of my mouth heavy & I look at my feet a lot. This is the time of the year when I lost the thing I didn't really know I had. My friend. My only true ally.
My father was not in any way a perfect specimen on which to judge mankind. He was eternally flawed, no one would argue. He complained too much & drank too often. He also invented porcupine kisses & read encyclopedias as if they were novels.
Its been 5 years now without him. And I can still smell him. A mixture of his cologne & apple chewing tobacco. Not exactly Chanel, but when it hits me I am suddenly comforted, no matter where I am or what I'm doing. Odd, I know.

Christmas was never his season, he was a Spring man. That was when he could stop wearing so many layers, when the walk to get to his weekly card game was not a frozen trek & all of the plans he'd been devising all winter for his prized vegetable garden could start to come to fruition. Spring was his season.
Summer had its perks but Spring was were it all began. I've always been an Autumn girl. Opposites even in seasons.
Oddly, the thing I miss most are the arguments. I don't fight with anyone the way I fought with him. There was an abandon there that I've found with no one else. I was never afraid of offending or going too far. I trusted that he would never get angry, the argument would never turn personal & when it was over, it was as good as forgotten. No grudges were held or stern silences kept. And they always ended the same way, with a cup of tea.
Sometimes I pretend that it never happened. That I miss him only because he is at home & I am not. I pretend that it is geography that separates us. My fantasy never lasts very long, I always remember. Even so I cherish my brief delusional moments.
The thing that invades my dreams. The thing that makes it impossible for me to sleep at all. Is the not knowing. Other people can tell me. I've read the books. I can tell myself. But I will never really know if he knew how much I loved him. I will never really know if he knew how grateful I was to him. Because being the self absorbed person that I can tend to be, I never said 'thank you'.

Making peace with a ghost is no easy task. And I know I may never find the stillness I seek. But in searching for it I do seem to have found a slightly better understanding of a man I thought I knew. And a deeper appreciation for the people still near me. Anniversaries come every year whether I want them to or not. They never seem to get easier. I don't know that they ever will. But I got through this one without crawling into a fetal position & ugly crying. That's progress. It's not peace. But its something.



Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there.
I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry;
I am not there.
I did not die.


-Mary E. Frye