Hi Dad,
Tomorrow, or actually it's already tomorrow, ends the second year that we have been here and you have been there. I'm still not all that invested in afterlife daydreams -- just what exactly IS dad doing with all his free time?! -- preferring instead to focus on ways in which my life is muted without you here with me.
Example one. We're driving with J & B to Colorado -- Durango of all places -- and I had no idea the depth of my exclusive childhood connection: Colorado = Dad. It doesn't hit me until several days into our trip and we're making the trek over the mountains from Durango to Telluride. I see the grandeur of the terrain...the heights, the sheer dropoffs, the carpet of evergreen trees...and I see you, in memory form, as a type of overlay that brings a haze of present tense into each scene. Had I chosen to write them down, stories of "You in Colorado" would have filled all the empty spaces of our car. It was physically painful, in an odd sort of way.
Example two. We have a puppy. You'd laugh with Tim and me, watching her antics. Clearly, at 3 and 1/2 pounds, she's no German Shepherd. Not a real dog. More like part rodent, part feline, part bat, and last and least, part dog. Despite the combo, I know you'd approve and though she's just a pet and not a child, there's a tiny part of me that thinks the experience of bringing her into the human world would be fuller, if you could share it with me.
Well, I think I'd like to copy down a story that I would have read to you, perhaps at your birthday gathering later this month, that would have made you smile:
