Christy Writes: On the death of my father and what really matters

The unexpected death of my father on Christmas night left a whirl of emotions in its wake, further complicated by the practical concerns of funeral planning and cleaning out his apartment, and the usual family-flavored holiday stress sprinkled over everything like powdered sugar.

As Sophia Petrillo so memorably put it, death sucks. At least for those of us who are left behind. There’s a strange stillness that descends the moment you hear the news and it hovers there, holding you in a suspended animation of disbelief until your brain nudges you forward again. The concepts of life and death are hard enough for me to get my head around at any given moment; don’t even get me started on trying to comprehend how I can have a routine conversation with someone and just hours later, be told I might as well put the phone down because this time they won’t be picking up.

I’ve lost all my grandparents and other assorted relatives and friends over the years, and my stepdad died in 2013, but all of those times, someone else handled everything. This was the first time I’ve had the label ‘next of kin’ slapped on me. My sister and I just looked at each other. Dad? Dead? What? Buh?

We got through it, of course, because what else could we do? We pulled together a nice little service, we cleaned out his apartment, and as I write this I’m back in my own home, contemplating the box of ashes on the desk in front of me and wondering how many life lessons the universe can throw at me at one time.

For me, the biggest takeaway from all this is how few things in life actually matter. Cleaning out my father’s apartment, I found notes he had written to himself about bills and chores, an angry letter to a friend over some disagreement between them, lists, reminders, all the ephemera of daily life that I’m sure had seemed to him, even momentarily, to be very important. And where is all of that now? In the garbage. It doesn’t matter.

As I sat at the memorial service, listening to friends and family members talk about my father, I found the things that do matter. Memories he made with people, his sense of humor, his love of singing, one friend even mentioned how much my father loved rainbow trout. Does it matter that he loved rainbow trout? Not really. But the fact that this friend, whenever he sees rainbow trout on a menu, will smile and think of my father… yeah. It actually does matter. All of that stuff matters, and it matters a lot more than silly arguments or when the electric bill was due.

One of the most poignant parts of losing a parent is realizing that you’re now at the front of the line. Someday it will be my turn to go. Someday someone else will have to sift through my belongings. Someday someone else will be looking at a box of my ashes and thinking about me. Now might be a good time to start telling people that I love rainbow trout too.

Rest in peace, Dad.

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