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We've had seven weeks without him and slowly, steadily, his mark on our home is fading. There will be a day when there is no more Christmas cake... no last jar of his delicious windfall apple jelly... or pots of his favourite peppermint tea - we drink it, but not often, so I can't imagine any more will be bought when this packet is finished.
I've found myself burying my face in his jumpers in the hope of a remembered smell.
All the efficient practicality of the hours and days after he died have passed now too. I fooled myself into thinking I was ok. I was for a while. A funeral attended by around 450 people went like clockwork; warm, affectionate and tearful but with laughter and his favourite hymns - two of which he and I sang the day before he left us - he croaking from his pillow and me doing my best with a lump the size of everest in my throat.
The paperwork... policies.... banks.... legal matters - some relating to his older, bewildered sister who
is now my responsibility... And some for my mother all processed, organised and in order. Now I've lifted my head I wonder where everyone has gone? We'd several hundred people in our home over the five days between his passing and his funeral... and I breezed through - 'coping', dealing with, arranging.. Now? Now I cry at the sight of a slice of Christmas cake and a pot of apple jelly.
I need to knit I think. Socks. New challenges.
oh Etta I totally understand what you are going through My heart aches for you. It is sooo hard the months after. I also have a shirt here of my dads and from time to time I smell it, but the smell of him is gone now. Remember the good times and all the precious memories that you have. <3 <3 <3
ReplyDeleteThanks Laura - we've so many wonderful memories of dad as you'll have of your dad too. Grateful for that.
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