Dad

Dad left on a very cold, dark, foggy evening. He hadn’t packed anything noteworthy. I assumed he would be home the following morning but mom seemed to know differently. I was only 14. I believed he would go drag my sister home and I grinned maniacally and chittered and snickered at the thought of her finally getting in trouble for running off. Mom was not enthused by my smile. She shook her head in silent disappointment. What did I know then? By the next month I was convinced dad had tracked her some distance away and would catch up soon and come home. I held tightly t that belief for an age. Convinced the only thing separating us was time. Slowly, I had convinced myself that he was bullet proof. He was an armadillo right? Maybe he had special training, or armor, or..something. Something that gave him an edge over any other evil in this world. I had spent my childhood knowing this man to be the strongest, most determined, kindest force known to mankind.
He wasn’t afraid to get dirty, or scrape his knees. He was my hero. But I had never seen him fight. I had seen his seriousness. His pain. He never hid his emotion, but he showed us how to express pain in a safe way. He taught me how to breathe. Not the breathing the body does on its own but the breathing you have to think about. He taught me how to talk about my feelings without yelling. And he listened. He taught me how to cook, how to bandage wounds, and reset a broken bone. He taught me how to remove the very fine layer of skin from rodents and make a meal out of a pest.
And now he had gone on an adventure. Always one step behind my disobedient sister. Please forgive the tears on the pages. I still cry when I think about my naiveté during those early years. I ask myself what more I could have done to keep my family together. Realistically I know the answer is nothing. There was nothing I, as a child, was responsible for. But the guilt eats me alive every day.