This is the text of a story that I wrote following a conversation with a childhood friend who had recently lost her father. Her circumstances are very similar to those when my father (Pop) left on his journey September 29, 2008. She is the same age that I was then, with three children (two that are the ages my sons where at the time), and has the perception that she must be the rock, the strength, and keep everyone on schedule. She is angry, an understatement. After talking with her about her grief, I thought a great deal and asked God to give me the words that could possibly give her a slight bit of comfort this Father's Day. This is the result.
“God, it’s me...Daddy’s Girl” sitting on a park bench looking at the lake.
“God, it’s me...Daddy’s Girl” sitting on a park bench looking at the lake.
“I am very angry with you, with my Daddy, with the world...” She could not understand why everyone at the park was moving so fast… like rays of light. It was like she was looking into their world. It was bright and warm. Her world was very cold and dark...like a cave with no lights.
“I don’t understand why you needed to take MY daddy when you did…,” she said as the tears started to run down her face like a waterfall. “Why did he have to let you take him, too?
“Why him? Why now?
Don’t you know that I still need my daddy?!?” Daddy’s girl looked up to the sky.
In her most angry voice, Daddy’s Girl said, “I want my daddy back!” She was scolding the sky.
Her head dropped into her hands as she sat on the bench and sobbed. “Why?”
She sat there looking at her hands as if she held her shattered heart in it thinking … My Daddy always knew how to mend my heart. No one can mend my heart like my Daddy.
Daddy’s girl took in a deep breath, “I want to sit next to my daddy again. I want to talk to him about … everything. I am not ready for him to not be here! I can’t do this life without him!” She took a deep breath and looked around her to see if anyone could tell she was crying. She was sure that people would see her crying and talking to herself and think she was out of her mind.
“God?” Daddy’s Girl asked, “Would it have made a difference if we had made other choices?” Sucking in a deep gasp of air and wiping the tears from her chin, “I just don’t understand it all.”
Daddy’s girl just sat there and stared out … “God, Is my daddy there with you right now? Does he know how much I miss him? Does he know how hard it is each day to even wake up? How I don’t want to go anywhere because I always run into someone that wants to tell me that they are sorry that he is gone and tell me stories about him? Does he know how angry I am that he isn’t here?”
She just sat still while images of her daddy and her played out as a movie in front of her.
“I need his strength, his sense of humor, his wisdom, his teasing me, his hand holding mine… I want to hear him say that he loves me again.”
She felt the air barely move around her. Looking down at her hands again and the shattered heart, Daddy’s girl noticed that a couple of the pieces were now touching. She could still see the fracture, but they were touching.
The wind seemed to wrap itself around her like a blanket … a blanket that her daddy would cover her up with when she was a little girl. Only … Daddy’s girl wasn’t a little girl anymore … she was a beautiful young woman and a mother that embodied everything her Daddy ever was.
It got brighter and as she looked up, light was streaming through the clouds down on her. Her Daddy was sending her a hug and telling her that he had heard every word she had said. Her Daddy knew that she was angry and that she missed him, but was watching her everyday. He saw his strength in her and his wisdom. He also saw in her his heart. A heart that was giving and loving and that served God in so many ways that she did not even know she was doing it. He wished that he could hold her hand again but knew that would happen when it was her time take the same journey. He wished that she could hear him say “I love you,” but that would happen when it was her time to take the same journey.
The time for her to take that journey would not be up to her, it would not be up to him… It would be up to God.
Her Daddy made her a promise, that he knew she could not hear, that he was and would always be watching over her and would always love her. He hoped that when she felt the wind wrap around her that he was hugging her. He hoped that she knew how beautiful she always was and will be. He hoped that she knew that he and God were with her in the darkness … when it was time, his hand and God’s would be there to help her find her way.
Daddy’s Girl closed her eyes and leaned back on the bench. When she opened them, the sky was not as bright as it had been and the clouds were filling the sky like puffs of cotton … and for a few brief seconds she felt a little comfort but knew that her journey here was not done.
As she stood up from the bench to walk to her car, she turned around and looked up at the sky and said, “Daddy, I love and miss you too.”
Written with Love
Miss Marjorie
