Reaching for Eudaimonia

These muggy summers have me missing the fresh air of springtime. I miss the budding lilies in your resting place where the softest moss grows in place of tragedy. Sometimes I run out there through the twigs leaving snags in my shirts and my hands feeling their way through brush. I know I get small cuts on my knuckles but it's worth it to talk to you. I miss those days when the house would be quiet enough to hear the hum of the geothermal system you managed to experiment with. You would curse under your breath when you found that the basement had flooded (yet again). I would chuckle silently hearing you come up the stairs in a huff. If you were here I'd ask you if it was alright that I had made all these mistakes in your absence. I would ask you what it is I'm supposed to be looking for. I would ask you for help. Mom called this my love letter to my father. I suppose it is, really. I made my peace long ago not to discuss my pain in full detail with people. I neve...

It has been a while since I wanted to talk to you. I have been having a lot going on recently and have felt overwhelmed by all these changes. I suppose I've gotten used to changes again. But I admit that I have been one to hold on a little too tightly to things, especially when there isn't much to be done. To be honest I don't really know how I am feeling as of late. It comes in waves. I am happy then sad, then stressed, then elated, then somber, then exhausted. The cycle of this has been on repeat the last couple of weeks. I haven't been writing to you lately. This makes me sad. It isn't that there isn't anything I wish to say or anything. I've just been consumed. Consumed has always been an interesting word, especially as an excuse. But I suppose that is what this hesitant hello is... an excuse to tell you everything you've missed. I accomplished a goal, Howard. I've met a goal that I didn't know I could accomplish. But now I'm le...

"I can't ever escape Jane Austen," He would say in exasperation. There we would be, Mom and I, on the couch with popcorn in our hands and tissues on the table. We were (yet again) watching the BBC versions of the Jane Austen novels. We'd smile hesitantly, almost guilty, for watching Pride and Prejudice for the third weekend in a row. Mom and I basically had the lines down for some of the scenes and were not ashamed to practice them in public, laughing and smiling uncontrollably. "Howard, we cannot help it if Colin Firth is perfection," I would say to him. He'd lift one of his thick grey and black brows and cross his arms. "How is this productive?" He'd say. "You're the one who bought these DVDs!" I'd say back. Mom would laugh at our bantering. And of course Howard would just mumble something under his breath and make a break for it to escape the English romantics. I always thought that was a little odd since h...

Running with him was as much a part of me as my bones or my heart. The day he died my heartbeat seemed to slow to a melody I didn't recognize. I kept trying to find the tempo, the exact moment my inner conductor decided to signal a molto ritardando.  I couldn't do it.  I was too slow to rewind myself backward. I was stuck in slow motion, moving from room to room with dragged feet and crumpled shirts. My body forgot what it felt like to hit the ground hard and confident, pushing against it to move forward.    I was used to my heartbeat being synchronized to his when we would race towards the finish line. Now that he was gone, who was I going to run next to? The couch became my coffin for a year. My eyes were constantly in motion, shifting from the television to our old cat that would stare out the window, wondering when he was going to come in from outside. I would have to tell her to come away. I would try to shelter her under the blankets and hold her ti...

Photo I took of Howard during the 2010 snowstorm. The storm came in quick and covered the forest in a thick blanket of snow. It shrouded the house and weighed down the branches. It went up past our ankles when we marched through it. Howard took out his camera to get some pictures of the house and the trails. We stopped periodically to make snow angels or have a snowball fight.  The rainy blizzard stuck to the silver hairs on his beard making him look like a snow giant. Mom's purple hat was slowly collecting snowflakes too. Both of their cheeks were stained pink. When we laughed our exhales were visible. "Mom, kiss Howard in the snow," I said. I took my own camera and began snapping as many photos as I possibly could. When it snowed over five inches the house ended up looking like something in a postcard or a wintery wonderland.  Photo I took of Momma and Howard during the 2010 snowstorm. Sometimes when we walked through the forest we would hear ...

Dear Dad, I trusted someone. I really trusted someone and they broke it.  “You’re only broken if you choose to be,” You said to me after my first heartache. “I know, I know,” I say to you out loud in the heavy darkness of the guestroom. I can’t sleep in my room. I can’t spend more than two minutes in there. “Get out of your head. Stop replaying that part. Stop thinking about it. You didn’t do anything wrong. Don’t let this break you,” You say. But it has. “What if I can’t do it on my own?” I ask you.   No reply. They come over, one after the other, in the afternoon when the sun is setting just below the treetops. The living room is painted pink by the sunset. That used to make me smile. They tell me they can’t see beyond the wall I’ve put up. They say when they search my eyes for recognition they can see I’m inhabiting some other world. I remember this world. I remember it too well. Their arms are like anchors around my body trying to...

My father was the most rational person that I knew. He could help anyone pull themselves out of an emotional breakdown. He knew I was an over-thinker... a really destructive over-thinker. He would always pull me out when I would bury myself with the world.  He would ask me how I could take something so small and insignificant and somehow warp it into something that didn't resemble the original.  I didn't have an answer to this. I joked with him that my over-thinking could be helpful when planning a plot twist in one of my novels, but we both knew that it was a problem.   I wish he was here to give me advice. I am going through an emotional earthquake as of late. Yet, I know what he would tell me to do.  "Don't let anyone have that much control over your emotions, Kateleigh." I still hear his words in my head, although his face has started to fade. I haven't managed to figure out how to implement this life lesson. Sometimes I wonder if...

Dear Dad, You died a year ago today. The foggy recollection that this is no longer an approaching inevitability, but rather a fact that I need to accept is mind-numbingly painful. I still try to remember that day, the day you left us. Sometimes the memories seem hazy, but other times I see it in a monotonous pattern constantly on replay. A year ago it was sunny and unnaturally warm for the first day of December. It was a Sunday and I had come home straight after my weekend job at the little mom-and-pop café. When I got home you were dressed to do yard work. “How was work?” You asked. “Fine. Kind of a slow day, actually,” I replied. You smiled and gave me a hug. I was glad to be home. I had a test in Physics that coming Thursday and wanted to study as much as I could. Mom was cleaning the kitchen, preparing for dinner. You said that you wanted something spicy to eat. We planned on watching Masterpiece Theatre that night. “Are you going outside to work?...

I have to be honest about this process. I write these passages often times with tears rushing down my face, gasping for air by the end and praying that I could find some peace. Sometimes the salt from my tears irritates my skin and dries it out. It stings. I have to tell you what my mother told me a couple of days ago. First, I want to mention that my mom reads this blog. She knows that some of the most personal ways that she coped is on here for everyone to see. She doesn’t say anything about being uncomfortable about it. I asked her how she felt. I asked her if there was anything that she didn’t want me to share. She told me that helping others understand is more important than any other insecurity she might have about it. She also told me that she could tell that I was holding back. I know what she means. I know I have to say it eventually. I know the day is coming when everyone who reads this will want to know how he died, if that isn’t already the case. As she...