Of dads, helicopters, and goodbyes
My dad would have turned 84 years old today. There was a day when I would have expected someone that age to have already moved on to the next life, but nowadays, that number sounds younger and younger.
Clearly, I’m getting older. It was my use of the word “nowadays” that gave it away, right?
I am now the age that all those old people were when we threw surprise birthday parties for them. (Side note to anyone who might be curious: I’m expecting a Big 6-0 party in a couple of years.)
This morning, as I went out to get in my car on my way to a meeting, I heard helicopter rotors, and I immediately thought back to a Sunday that we gathered in a hospital parking lot. We were there to pray for my dad, and to yell out our love for him as they wheeled him out on a gurney and loaded him onto the helicopter that was taking him to another hospital, one he’d never walk out of.
I sat in my car this morning and cried. It’s weird how a sound can bring it all back, isn’t it? Sitting in the car, I told God that I really hoped my dad heard us that day. I’ve talked to God a lot since that day about my dad. I’ve asked God if there’s some way for Him to let my dad know how sorry I am for all the ways I made his life harder than it had to be.
Sure, I asked my dad to forgive me while he was still alive, but every so often I wonder if he really knew how really sorry I really was.
Helicopter sounds make me think of those lump-in-the-throat, one-sided goodbyes that feel so weighty; you know, the moments that make the words so very difficult to get out of your mouth.
“Dad, I … love you. I’m … sorry. I … don’t want you … to … go.”
I’m crying again, now, as I type those words.
The helicopter is long gone by now, both the one from this morning and the one from a few years ago.
My dad’s gone, too. We won’t be eating caramel cake tonight, and watching him laugh as he opens another Cracker Barrel gift card.
But we carry on, don’t we? We don’t act as if these days aren’t hard — after all, that would be disrespectful in light of the love we shared. But, we also don’t act as if these days are all we’ve got left. There are still so many good days. Days when helicopters don’t fly overhead, and when Tennessee beats Alabama, and when I pick up a Little Debbie Swiss Roll cake and eat it one layer at a time.
On those days, I feel him with me, encouraging me, leaning in close to me, and whispering in my ear, “I forgave you years ago because I always saw the man that you were becoming. Now go, be that man.”
Thanks, dad, for all the ways you impacted my life. The ways I saw before you left and told you about, but also for the countless ways I’ve seen since that I wish I had seen before you died.
Someday, we’ll have a conversation over lemonade and vanilla malts, and I’ll tell you all about it.
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