It is what it is

 My dad unexpectedly passed away a year ago last week from a heart attack. 

In a weird and possibly slightly macabre way, I had been looking forward to that day passing on the calendar. The non-emotional and practical part of my brain assumed it would get easier. 

Last year was the dreaded firsts. The first Easter without my dad and I comparing notes on the myriad of colors of peeps candy available and which color tasted better. My birthday without him where I wouldn’t hear the words he has said every May 17 for as long as I can remember: “Good job on another big year.” Followed by his birthday in early June where I would treat him to strawberry shortcake at one of our favorite restaurants: burgerville. 

Those were the hard ones. Oddly enough Father’s Day wasn’t too bad nor was Fourth of July. It wasn’t until around about Labor Day that the sadness and emptiness really creeped in, seeping into what seems like all parts of my life. I missed our conversations about the warm weather stretching into late September and the weeks where the days start getting shorter around mid- October or so. He would patiently explain to me (again) what was happening with the sun and the moon and the seasons and the darkness. Sometimes I would feel better and be able to power through the shock of the arrival of late sunrises and early sunsets. Sometimes not. Either way, he would repeat every time, every year, it is what it is.

A glib response? Yes. Helpful? No. Comforting? Not really. But in a meta type way, him saying it is what it is and the grammatical and semantic frustration of that saying also became symbolic of it is what it is. 

I naively thought that the one year anniversary of his death would be a turning point. I thought I wouldn’t feel so raw and so robbed. I thought my grief would level out and maybe even plateau for a bit, giving my heart and brain a break.

I guess this is yet another first without him. Navigating my feelings and trying to cope with loss. Wading into waters that seem to have both no depth and an unfathomable deep drop off just short of the horizon.

The water near the shore that I spend most of my time wading  in is cold, but the shore is close and I can hop out anytime and stand on a beach towel in the sand and examine my feet for any chips in my toenail polish. But the real stuff is farther out. Where a life jacket is necessary, where I’m in danger of both hitting the bottom — or worse, realizing there is no bottom and it never level outs. 

I hate both those places. I wish my dad was there on the beach collecting driftwood to make us a fire to roast hot dogs. Where he would spread a paper towel on the log for us to display the rocks and shells we found while beachcombing. The reality is that all three of those exist. Both together and separately. They each need each other to grieve and continue moving forward. I don’t like it, but I guess it is what it is.