Just a Spoonful of Sugar Helps the Grief Go Down...

You know, people told me that I would have moments of sadness about my dad.  I believed them, but I don't know when I was expecting those moments would happen.

Well, ok, I thought that it would be when I looked at a picture of him or when a particular holiday or birthday was approaching - something very pointed and sentimental.  I'm finding this is not the case.  In fact, when those pointed, sentimental opportunities come along and I find myself saying to myself, "I wish Dad was here - or he's missing this event" only to be reminded that he's probably not - just watching from a different dimension, and I find that I am not sad at all, much to my amazement.

Grief hits when I least expect it to from very unsentimental sources - or so I think and it hits me fast and hard.  Here is a classic example that just happened a couple of days ago:

I'm folding laundry in the bedroom and channel-surfing to find something to watch while I fold.  I land on the movie "Mary Poppins" because that's what you do when there's nothing else on TV.  (Besides I love the movie.)  Anyway, all in an instant, I'm taken back to when I was 6 or 7 years old and Dad took me to the Plaza Theater in Cedar Rapids to see "Mary Poppins" for the first time (it had been re-released in theaters).  I remember after the first showing of the movie I begged him to sit through the second showing (back when you could do that...) and he said that was ok.  Granted, he slept through the second one!  I remember being so excited and the movie was so AWESOME and we got to see it twice!  The memory still so vivid 39 years later and I realized in that instant that I hadn't thought about it in years.

All of this took place in about a second.  And as soon as I remembered, the tears flowed and continued to roll as I continued to fold.  And I couldn't turn the movie because I didn't want to lose the memory and just when the movie was over and the channel was turned, the tears and the grief vanished.

That's the crazy thing about grief - it's here in a moment and then it's gone.  It's like popping through a chalk painting or snapping your fingers or a change in the wind.