He took a seat at the long kitchen table, the white paint beginning to peel away from the wood as he set down his mugh with a thump. The liquid inside was a dark, ominous, shade of brown. Coffee, with no milk or sugar to soften the biting taste of the bitter-brewed decafinated beverage. Just black, the way he liked it, simple.
He sipped it slowly, flipping through the pages of the newspaper as he did, adjusting his glasses when they threatened to slip from his face and smiling as the sun streamed through the window beside him. He didn't have any plans to go golfing this morning, he was going to head out and weed the garden instead.
This is how I want to remember him. The man who made sure my life was full of smiles, loving family and good advice. Instead, all I see when I close my eyes is a frail shadow of who he used to be. A weakening, gaunt looking man with green bags under his eyes and a smile that used to light up the room. No more booming laugh or huge prescence, only a man who once was grand, now reduced to using a walker to get from his bed to the armchair and back.
It scares me that I see him this way. I want to remember his sparkling eyes, his radiant smile and the way he carried himself like no other. How everyone turned when he walked in the room and you couldn't help but sit a little straighter, laugh a little harder and enjoy life just a little better when he was around. How you were content to sit around in silence and simply soak it all in.
I want to remember hiss bad jokes, his terrible french accent, rusty from lack of use, on a sunday morning, his unique scent and mannerisms and most of all, I want to remember his hugs. The large bear kind that you almost felt suffocated in but not quite. The ones that made you feel safer than anywhere else, comforted without having to hear a single word and loved like nothing else could ever seem to. The hugs that made life a little easier when the world seemed to be against you.
I want to remember it all. Every last bit. And I want to be able to smile when I think back on it like I know he would want me to. Because I know life isn't easy right now, and it might never be, but we'll never know until we try and there will always be someone out there who has it worse. So why not be the one to show them that it gets better? That they aren't alone in this? Because I know that if he was here today, that's what he'd still be doing. The one thing I'll continue to do until my dying day.
Take every opportunity to make someone smile, even when they look like they want to cry, because a little happiness can go a long way.
YOU ARE READING
With Broken Wings (2013)
Poetry"Take these broken wings and learn to fly again." This is my own personal story of overcoming my demons and my grief. I define my recovery. ι'ℓℓ вє уσυя ѕнσυℓ∂єя тσ cяу ση, уσυя яσcк ωнєη уσυ'яє ησт ѕтяσηg ι'ℓℓ вє уσυя нєαят ωнєη ιт'ѕ вяσкєη, му α...
