It was just a couple of days ago. November 15th.  That day will forever have new meaning for me.  It was that day one year ago, that we lost a father, a husband, a grandpa, a brother.  Someone recently asked me if it was “sudden”.  I paused and said, well, kind of.  It wasn’t anything as sudden as an auto accident, but, things happened pretty quickly and before we knew it, he was gone – and with that, our lives changed forever.  It was then that we were forced to start a new phase of our life as a family.  One where there had to be a new normal – a normal that none of us  wanted.  But yet, it was here. 

During the last year, the journey has been anything but easy.  It often struck me about that I really had no idea how much of an impact my Dad had on my every day life until he was gone.  The adage of not knowing what you have until it’s gone – well, I think there is a whole bunch of truth to that.  Everyone deals with grief in different ways, but, one thing is pretty consistent – the power of grief is palpable. It is intense – at times, it becomes almost overwhelming. It is individual – grief is never the same from one person to another and is unique to the person experiencing it. It is random – hitting you when you least expect it.

Over the course of the last year, I have experienced all of these attributes of grief. But, with the grief I’ve experienced, I have also begun to see things from a different perspective…a perspective of gratitude. As I’ve been more intentional in my practice of gratitude, I have started to see things with respect to my Dad very differently. I have often wondered if this is a chicken and the egg thing – did my thoughts of gratitude for my Dad come because I was being more intentional with respect to gratitude, or, was it my attention toward the things that I was so grateful for in my Dad that led to me being more grateful in general. In the end, it really doesn’t matter. What matters is that I have been able to see more clearly all of those things for which I am eternally grateful for in the man I was lucky enough to call Dad.

I have been able to reflect and thank my Dad for all of the amazing gifts he gave me over the course of my life. I’m not talking about the material things (though, the drum set was really awesome). Rather, it’s the intangible things like how to treat people, how to be kind, how to respect others. I smile when I think about one of his bad (but oh so good) jokes and I laugh about how he let me get away with something he probably already knew about (I’m sure my Mom is thinking about the same thing I’m thinking about now! :). I am grateful for his text messages and the way he ended each one with “Love, Dad” even though I knew they were from him. I am grateful for his voice and how, when he ended a phone call, instead of saying “goodbye”, it was more of “du-bye”. I am grateful for his desire to always be present – even in those times when he would be sleeping in his chair and suddenly wake up and start giggling as if he was always part of the conversation. I am grateful for his hands – the hands that built so many beautiful things (and fixed next to everything). I am grateful for the relationship he and my Mom share. It is a once-in-a-lifetime love that was easy for anyone to see. But, most of all, I am eternally grateful for the opportunity to spend my life with my role model, my mentor, my friend and the person I was lucky enough to call Dad.

So…I’ll never really know if my recent focus on gratitude has allowed me to see more clearly my gratefulness for him or if my gratitude toward him has led me down my personal journey with gratitude. Do I still experience grief with the loss of my Dad, without question. But what I do know is that my Dad is on this journey with me. In fact, I think he probably always was. Through his genuine kind and compassionate way in which he lived his life, he was always teaching me about how to live life through the lens of gratitude. And for that Dad, I will be forever grateful.