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January 29, 2004
I was in the grocery
I was in the grocery today when I realized I never asked Dad how to make his kabobs. It was his own recipe, and a favorite of mine - he used to make it when I came home to visit, before he got throat cancer and had to have all of his teeth pulled.
I've been wondering this week about why some people die and some get to live. I know there isn't an answer - that we're supposed to chalk it up to faith or God or chance - but I still wish there was some reason to it, some theory that we could use to figure things out. A co-worker of mine, although not someone I knew, was killed earlier this week when his van slid into a salt truck on the way home from work. He was forty-five, had young kids, and from the tears shed by the people in his department, was a good man. What factor about him or his life triggered that it was time for him to die? Why did my dad, who a really good man and a good dad, have to die, when a someone else I know's father, who doesn't appear to particularly care much for his family, get to go on living? But being good has nothing to do with it, does it.
There's a girl whose father got sick a little after my dad did. She's not someone I actually know, but she has a similar interest, and I sometimes read her online journal. The doctors told her family her dad might not make it at the same time they told mine that Dad would pull through, that they could get his cancer into remission. I just read that her father got to go back to work last week. She's clearly happy, and relieved to have her life back the way it was. I'm happy for her, but I don't think I want to read any more about her life. At least not right now.
I was having a relatively good day up until the grocery moment, and maybe it'll improve this evening - I'm going to have a glass of wine, and finish the scarf I'm making for my brother.
But I guess I don't get to know Dad's recipe. And I can taste them right now.
Posted by Kristin at 7:13 PM
January 28, 2004
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create your own visited states map
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Posted by Kristin at 7:21 AM
January 20, 2004
Eulogy. When you learn that
Eulogy.
When you learn that a parent hasn't long to live, you begin to think of
things you wish you had done - asked more questions, discussed more,
argued less. Although I've always visited as much as possible, I've spent
a lot of time recently wishing I hadn't moved so far from home, and that
I'd spent more time with him the last few years.
But the more I've thought about it, the more I've realized that my father was part of the reason I could move away - he made me want to travel and to see new places. And then I realized that much of who I am is because of my dad. I'm interested in history because of him. I've learned to cook because Dad loved to cook. I'm a photographer because my dad bought me a 35mm camera the Christmas I was fifteen. I ride horses because my dad thought I'd gone too far by fashioning a saddle out of the back of the sofa and told my mom that they had to buy me a pony. I love the outdoors because he started me camping before I had my first birthday. My brother and I have four geography degrees between us - unquestionably Dad's influence. With Dad's encouragement (as well as my mother's, although she's always pretended to be outraged), we've always had more animals than is probably reasonable.
I'm going to miss more than I can say calling Dad with new recipes, to
tell him about a new place I've visited or a new history book I've read,
or to share the details of the weather - he loved the idea of a good storm
more than anyone I've ever known. I hate that if I have the good fortune
of a family of my own one day that Dad won't be here to share it. I am
grateful, however, that I got to have him in my life for the thirty-three
plus years that I did.
Dad cared little for sentimental gestures, so I'll stop. But I'll continue
to travel, to read, to take pictures, to ride horses, to have an
admittedly strange fascination with natural disasters, and to probably
always have more animals than is reasonable.
Posted by Kristin at 7:00 PM