The workings of the human mind and our emotions never cease to amaze and baffle me, and this has never been more clear as I sit here on public transit choking back tears.

I realize now that I operate a certain way when it comes to loss and grief. When I was a teenager I lost my grandparents within a little over a year apart. Five years ago the man who was my example, my template, my hero and my father passed away without warning. In all of these cases I held my head high, got through what had to be done, and then a few months later some trigger finally is pulled inside of me and I have to actually deal with my grief. Today is the day where I finally realize that the empty seat at the dinner table of my life isn’t going to get filled again by my father-in-law Richard.

One of the sad parts about the human condition is our amazing capacity to take for granted that which is always around us and only being able to appreciate those things once we can’t take them for granted any more. Maybe this is the reason that my grieving process works the way it does. I have no idea. I just know that it’s my process and I have to own it.

I hold an incredible amount of love for my father-in-law because of the many great things he was. I was never in a branch of the armed forces, but he was a Marine. He had already served his country long before I met him but this man was a Marine, tried and true, to the very end. I believe he served two tours of duty in the Vietnam War, he saw sights that I hope never to see in my lifetime, yet through all of that he was proud to be a Marine. I admire the heck out of that, to have gone to Hell and back and to still have the level of conviction and pride that he had.

One of the greatest things in my life, my daughter, I might not have if it weren’t for this man and it all began with the simple nod of the head. My lovely wife and I had already depleted just about all of our resources in trying to become parents despite infertility. We had depleted savings and accumulated an incredible amount of debt trying to do something that so many people take for granted (there it is again, taking things for granted). In a phone call where my wife vented her frustration to her mom, fresh in the knowledge that to pursue adoption in the manner we wanted to it would cost us an amount equal to (if not greater) than we had already spent. I can only imagine the exchange that was going on at the other side of the phone, hundreds of miles away, where my mother-in-law may have had a look on her face that said, “Can we help?” The part I don’t have to imagine is the nod. She conveyed to us that Richard had looked at her and just gave a simple nod of yes. She may have not even had to give him a look, I don’t know, but that nod… that simple little act of moving ones head up and down in an affirmative manner… it changed my life. Everything that I am now, every decision that I make in life, all of it… stems from that simple nod. (Point of Clarification: I don’t mean to minimize my mother-in-law’s impact and contribution to this moment as well. I’m just attempting to emphasize how without a moment’s hesitation Richard did something so incredibly simple that was like a rock tossed into the middle of still water; the ripples of that impact still haven’t reached shore and continue their journey outward to this day).

Now that I’m a father I can also say that one of the things I miss most about Richard is just how much of an amazing grandparent that he was. My daughter didn’t just love him, she absolutely adored him. The moment she would walk through their door I would count down the moments until I would hear her yell, “GRANDPA!” because of how much she loved seeing him. I didn’t really have that type of relationship with my grandparents and I’m so thankful that my daughter has been able to.

I know that no matter what pain I’m going through in my grieving process it can’t possibly compare to what my daughter feels when I even try to contemplate the amount of complete and unconditional love she had for Richard, and that may be where part of my grieving is stemming from today because I can only imagine how it would have continued for her if he was there to see her driving a car for the first time, graduation, even possibly on her wedding day. Part of me is grieving for her loss as well.

I’ve got more inside me that I’m sure I want to say here in the digital realm as part of my coping process but I’ve got to stop. I’m a few short stops away from work and I’ve really got to pull myself together. So let me wind this up for now by simply saying something to my father-in-law. Richard, I miss you. I didn’t realize just how important you were to me when you were here and I’m sorry I didn’t ever get to tell you that. Thank you for everything that you helped bring in to my life. Thank you for taking me in as part of the family and for giving me all of these wonderful people in my life. Thank you for everything you did in your life to help protect the freedoms that I take for granted every day. Thank you for helping me to become a father. Thank you for being there. I love you.

-Will

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