Happy New Year?

I'm at home on bereavement leave. My father died three days after Christmas. I just met him last year...well not last year because now it's next year but last, last year.

He and my mom divorced when I was just a wee one. (3? I think?) He chose to be the non-existant type. My mom NEVER talked about him, ever. She remarried when I was five and I consider that man my father, my dad, my man to compare all men to.

Fast forward to my 38th year, I get an e-mail out of the blue. I've remained close to my grandmother, his mother, my entire life. I told her right after I got my taxes back that I'd be out to see her with the kids in tow. She lives in the middle of no where and there ain't much to do. The plan was to spend a day or two at the amusement parks (along the scale of which we just don't have around here) and then drive out to see her for a couple of days. 'Lo and behold, a quick little electronic missive and I was suddenly faced with not just a week alone with my kids on the road (so to speak) but to meet my father face to face? Ack!

I pulled up in the rental car after driving three hours and the first thing out of his mouth is "You're late!"

Jeebus - really? Really?

"You've waited this long, another couple of minutes isn't going to kill you," was my reply.

But things actually went a bit better after that and I even saw him again that summer when my SO and I went back for a convention near-by. That Christmas when I called my grandma, she was all broken up because he had collapsed, thinking he was having a heart attack. It turned out to be a tumor in his throat. And then another one on his esophogus. And it turned out to be terminal. And in the space of one year, I met the man and lost the man.

The kids and I, we all have his dimples.