It’s always the holidays, isn’t it?
Father’s Day (US) is today, and so my social media feeds are all filled with people sending love to their fathers or spouses, and fathers thanking their families for dedicating a day to them.
Some of us post comments about how much we miss our deceased fathers, but it’s not really the “done thing” because no one wants to come off like a jerk for being a downer on what is supposed to be a happy day.
Birthdays, anniversaries, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Christmas or Sukkot…those are times for festivities and joy.
But not so much for mourners. We can find joy, of course, and I’m sure we all try for the sake of our loved ones if not for ourselves. Yet, it boils down to persevering through a holiday that doesn’t not hold the meaning for us it used to.
As non-believers, we also bear the responsibility of trying to be nice when people assure us that our loved one is in heaven, that we’ll meet again, that they are not in pain anymore because they are with God.
It’s almost too much. I just want to slap people. Which, I feel it is important to say, is the totally wrong thing to do! No hitting. It’s bad.
No matter how much you (or I) feel like it. They mean well, even if they are being insensitive.
Personally, I don’t want to remember my father on Father’s Day, because mostly I think about how he is not here to celebrate it with me. I can sugar-coat that, but here on this blog I won’t do that. I miss him, it fucking hurts, and I’m jealous of everyone who does not feel this particular pain.
But I’m not jealous of those who believe they will see their loved one again in some bizarre afterlife. To me, that somehow feels like cheating life. It reduces the man my father was, that great and broken person, from a living memory to a childish hope. It’s an entirely selfish desire, and I can’t buy into that. Whatever I can say about my father with conviction it is that he lived and he died, and that matters.
He’s not anywhere now. I have no way of wishing a dead man “happy holidays.” That makes me sad, but what it reminds me of is to remember him every day. He “lives” in my heart and my memories, where I still need him most.
