My Dad.

After my father died, I found a letter that was written by my mother to him back in 1975 My dad had gone on a training course and was away for about three months and my mother had written to him to give him an update on how things were at home.

In the letter, she told him how his two year old daughter (me), had been going up to the gate to look out onto the street to wait for him. Apparently, I did this every single day, and as I stood there, I would call out, "Daddy! Daddy!" and wait there for him to come. When I realised he was not coming home, I would stand at the gate and cry. My mother, in the letter, wrote how heart wrenching this act was and she hoped that I would eventually give up and stop looking for him.

I don't know if I gave up looking for him, though. The letter didn't indicate that I did, nor did I find other letters from that time. Rather, I gave up looking through the immense stack of letters exchanged between my parents over the periods of time when my dad was away. After reading two of them, I decided that perhaps it's best I not know anything about their exchanges.

Needless to say, my dad was my favourite parent. I still love him, even though it's been six years since he crossed over. And, like the two year old me, I still sometimes look for him.

Not long after his death, I sat in the lounge in his house and saw him, transparent and wearing his gardening clothes (blue checked shirt with blue shorts) walk from the kitchen, into the dining room, through the dining room table and then vanish.

In 2010, I saw him in a kind of half-dream, half-vision, in which he once again appeared in his gardening clothes (my father loved his garden and he loved gardening) to tell me, "You have work to do."

Even now, if I see an old man in blue shorts and sandals, I check to see if it's my dad. Even now, knowing well and truly that dad is never coming back to this particular life in the form I knew him.

And I miss him. Every day. I miss his advice. I miss his wisdom. I miss talking conspiracy theories and smoking with him while we sip coffee together.

I love you daddy.

September 2006 - four months before he died.