If today is a day of underscored grief, if you’re having a difficult time dealing with someone’s death, or if you’re in need of a general positivity grenade – this is for you.
Today is my first Father’s Day without a living father.
When he died in March, I received an outpouring of comments and emails and calls and offers of support, a flood of positive words and energy. These things, coupled with my memorial trip to Denver turned the entire ordeal into a beautiful, life-changing experience. I put together some thoughts on the subject back then, but it was tough to focus – I was still absorbing everything. In the past few months, my mind has often turned to this experience.
Regarding the aforementioned wordflood: there were caring, insightful, warm words that demonstrated how many of you actually read this and pay attention. Honestly, I was surprised; it’s often hard to fully grasp the level on which people relate to each other online, especially as a curator and owner of a blog that’s not always traditionally personal [more thoughts on this later]. Readers -some of whom I’d never exchanged a single word with- reached out, sharing stories of loss: past loss, recent loss, impending loss, their ways of dealing with loss. All these intense, heart-breaking and, seemingly, deeply personal experiences – experiences no one but the experiencer is really expected to relate to. Words ordinarily accepted and thanked for and filed away like old postcards. I half-expected this type of a reaction from myself, but, instead, I held on to these words and together they’ve woven a detailed map of grief and pain and compassion and camaraderie, and, ultimately, love. A palpable reminder of our interconnectivity as a species.
Perception equals reality – if you’re feeling alone or sad -and even if you’re feeling just fine-, I encourage you to think about this interconnectivity and see what happens. It may feel extraordinary, but it isn’t – not really. It’s a notion that some people are not only philosophically, peripherally aware of, but also able to carry within themselves day to day, letting it impact their every action. Perhaps not something I can readily, consistently embody and exude, but, man – those people, I suspect they might be on to something.
Just beautiful, Zo. Your Father has a wicked smile :)
Thank you for this post. I lost my Dad in October, and your post is very meaningful.
Great post, Zo. My dad’s been gone for 9 years now and Father’s Day is never not weird. Time to think about the good memories. Hang in there and have a great day.
Ten years last june 11th, and i often think “now it’s been long enough, i need to sit with him at the kitchen table and have breakfast together.” It is a tough void to live with, and it can never be filled, but trying to makes a bit of difference, i think. I’ve been tossing this into the void today: http://cornelisverhoeven.wordpress.com/2011/06/19/hands/
Hugs from Santorini.
my grandfather has been gone for 4 years, he had been like my father throughout my life. always loving, never judging. it’s honestly never easy, every single day is hard. but I do know that both him and my grandmother are together and happy. that’s all I can ask for. Thank you Zo. you are beautiful and strong, and I really appreciate your words today.
My father died five years ago – on his last Father’s Day, we weren’t talking. That still kills a part of me. I don’t think it ever gets easier, especially with the sentimental commercials and advertising at this time of year, but know that you are never alone with it. There are many like us! I take comfort in that.
Dear Z,
My father is deceased as well, going on 4 yrs, n it’s still odd. We fought alot bc we were so very alike, n I realize the finality of his death, but it doesn’t stop me from questioning what his thoughts would be on things, how it would be if he were here, etc. Your dad is your hero, n I really like the pic of you with the dog. It is a testament to adulthood that some of us have to wade through, its muck residue never washing off. existential hugs.
sending lots of squishy big hugs, hun. xoxo
Lots of love to you, Zo.
Every time I’m in that house, I can feel his energy all rushing thru me ^-^
Zo, I’ve been reading your blog for almost a year now, and I truly love every thing you post. Seeing your blog pop up on my feed always excites me, and I’m never disappointed by what you have to offer.
I can’t spend father’s day with my dad either, because he left 3 years ago and moved to the Philippines. For 2 years, I didn’t give father’s day a second thought, because it felt N/A to me at the time. Since going to the motherland and reconciling with him, father’s day has suddenly become important again. It saddens me to not be able to spend time with him, but at the same time, I know he’s thinking of me too. Interconnectivity, as you said.
Reading through your experiences with grief has helped me deal with mine, in a different way.
Thank you, and lots of love!!
http://widdlesh.blogspot.com
Zoetica –
It was a little over a month ago that my father passed away, and you were one of the first people I e-mailed and expressed how it felt. To some, it may sound a little ridiculous e-mailing someone about my father’s death that I’ve never met but always admired. To me, it made perfect sense because your father had also recently passed, and most of my friends, being in our early 20s, have yet to experience what it’s like to lose half of their assembly line. They could tell me, “Let me know if there’s anything I can do,” but REALLY didn’t fathom what I was going through. I know friends and family love me, but it’s a unique experience that is difficult in itself to relate to unless it has become one’s reality.
I read your Samsara post over & over that dreadful day on May 9th. The language you used in looking at a parent’s death gave me more strength than you’ll ever know, and I am beyond relieved and grateful that you took the time to recognize those, along with yourself, that have lost their fathers on this day made to appreciate them.
Much peace and strength to yourself, Zo, and to anyone that has experienced a core-shaking passing of a loved one.
We are memories that we leave behind with the people that we have touched. When my loved ones die I have all the moments with them to look back on. Those memories turn into stories told among others that are willing to listen. I try to do my best to leave behind the best memories I can. It’s a strange emotion that chokes me when I think of these things. All these people with such beautiful hearts sharing their grief. It’s such an interwoven mix of emotions. I’m not sure if there are truly words in the human language to express it.
I am thankful though, because I have loved.
Feeling this pain of loss makes me realize I have never been alone in my life.
The memory of us will live on even when we are gone.
I remember reading the replies to that post, dumbfounded at the outpouring of love and solidarity on what is usually a place for light-hearted exchanges about makeup and style.
I wanted to comment myself but couldn’t shake feeling like a fraud while typing the first words: my father is an anti-father, instead of protecting, he hurts his offspring. I had absolutely no positive feelings to share.
Now I feel the need to thank you for triggering – by sharing a very personal experience, which is something you do with reluctance – that outpour of comments, because I had, I have, a lot to grieve, the daughter I’m not, the father he is, Father’s Day itself… Before reading them I had no idea I needed to mourn.
So I thank you, and admire your courage and strength.
Thought about you yesterday, being in the same situation than you except for the part my father died when I was a teen. Time flows and still on Father day I wake up telling him in my mind how much I love him, and smile, thankful to be his daughter.
Much love and good vibes.
G.
I lost my father in April and this Father’s Day was a tad bit rough. Someone posted a link to this on their tumblr and I just wanted to thank you for putting to words all the emotions I was feeling.
Very clear and effective writing here, Zo. Pretty concise, too.
Loss can cause us to withdraw from those around us, and re-connecting can be very hard.
It takes trusting that there are others out there that care about your pain and will not use it against you (or knowing that some will and ignoring them). And that is not easy. So many people keep it inside and let it eat at them until it damages their entire ability to connect meaningfully with the living.
The pain we have is always our own, but sharing it is the only way we can fully realize that our pain is universal, and we have a world of people who can help us carry our own pain better simply by letting them know of it.
But like I said, not everyone will be willing to hear it, or share it, or even tolerate it. Sharing it can cause you to lose people as often as it can help you connect with others… but these are the scared and weak ones that need true connection the most. And hopefully someday they will find the strength, like you, to humbly share.
(that was a bit rambling, but you know how I am)
…I love.
Thank you, Zoetica for sharing your thoughts. My dad died around the end of April. Although, he and I were not very close, there are still moments where he was rather kind.
I also wanted to send a thanks to other commenters/readers for showing moral support.
I continue to look at you as a source of inspiration for so much more than things like style or art; but also as a person who can so eloquently present herself, even in times of deep and painful loss. I hope that when the time comes that I would have to say goodbye to my mom that I can have as much grace and consciousness to cope with the experience as you have. :)
Being a born misanthrope, I rarely let myself really feel the interconnectivity we all have, but it is something, isn’t it? The things in life that are our watershed moments and the ones we remember and memorialize the most—falling in love, giving/experiencing birth, having a loved one die and dying ourselves—are the things that we all have in common.
“Listen, kid, we’re all in it together” ~Harry Tuttle (Brazil)
Octavius spear of destined, no coin toss . come too corpus Christ.bless yourself in Him & get bizzy not dizzy princessa zoetica- ur boi rappin reggie.always.
“no blood? no tears? no glory!” – El Presidente Antonio de Padua María Severino López de Santa Anna y Pérez de Lebrón
o! i was just catching up on your posts and this one strikes me especially. it was posted 4 days after my little brother passed away. through the tragedy, it is my faith in the interconnected -and downright unified!- energies of the universe that keep him closer to me now, in death, than ever.
love to you & cheers to what we gain in loss.
<3
That really was beautiful, makes you stop and think. Thinking this way tends to help put my mind at ease. It will have been two birthdays passed that I’ll celebrate my brother without him here physically. October is a month we shared. This is a kind post, it’s helped reach one more person and I thank you for that. X