Friday, May 16, 2008

Little Trip

This morning, I did something out of the ordinary for me. I woke my boys and got them out the door with a neighbor for the before school pancake breakfast up at Brian's school.

But I didn't go with them.


Instead, I drove myself to the airport, hopped on an airplane and flew north, landed, picked up a rental car and drove to a courthouse.



And listened as a judge continually mispronounced my maiden name. Which isn't all that unusual, but today it really, really bothered me.

In a relatively short amount of time, he ruled that my father is indeed dead. Just one of 53 people on the docket today, who will be ruled dead.


I know my dad is gone....I was there. It's been awhile now...almost 3 years, in fact. Until that time 3 years ago, I had never experienced death in that personal of a way. To lose a parent is awful, to lose anyone is hard....no matter what the situation is, but to watch someone take their last breath on this earth is definitely a life changing experience.


Not the kind I would want to experience again.


Matthew, who was 15 at the time, summed it up then by saying that I could now see thestrals. And no, he does not believe in thestrals, nor do we believe Harry Potter is real, nor does it mean that he does not believe in Jesus, but it was the way his young brain was thinking at the time.

I thought it was brilliant.

Anyway, I sat in a court room and listened as my fathers case came up. No one knew I was there. No one knew that I was his daughter. No one knew that I had flown in just for this. No one knew anything about me.

Nor did they care.

So, in the matter of 8 minutes, my fathers life on this earth was all wrapped up.


I kept thinking to myself...8 minutes and 4 boxes. 8 minutes and 4 boxes. 8 minutes...and 4 boxes. After he died, I brought his belongings home...in 4 boxes. A whole life fit perfectly in 4 boxes.


The gavel sounded the end of his case and I walked out into the sunshine and back to my little rental car. I knew where I needed to go and where I needed to be. The airport. And home.


My flight home was uneventful and by 12:30, I was back in my corner of the world, with plenty of time to take a stroll on the beach before walking into my sweet little house.

My younger boys are home now, no different than they were this morning, with no knowledge of what happened today. They just know that their mom is home where she is supposed to be and that there are warm chocolate chip muffins on the counter.




=0)





1 comment:

  1. ok thanks for making me cry
    glad it's done
    now go pay scrabble =0)

    ReplyDelete

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