Text graphic reads: Today is the winter solstice. It also marks five years without my dad. My grief has been an odd and slowly emerging thing, in many ways, taking a while to fully settle in. I think losing someone at the height of COVID, before there were any vaccines even, is and will always be a uniquely strange experience. We almost didn't get to have a funeral for him, and the bare bones, short service we did have feels a bit like a dream in my memory. I barely know who was there, because we were sat at the front of the room and couldn't do a line to greet guests at the end because of social distancing restrictions. He was cremated, as he'd always said he wanted to be, so I never got to see him after his death. There was no viewing, no "saying goodbye." He was just gone. Today, five years later, he is still just gone, and I think a part of me is still waiting for him to come back.
We had a contentious relationship at times. I know he loved me, or at least he loved the person I was in his mind. I loved parts of him, but by the end of his life, we no longer really understood each other.
What hurts the most about his loss is what we could have had, and never quite did. He didn't really see me, and maybe I couldn't really see him, either. We are, in many ways, almost painfully alike. My grief in his loss is as much for the love that we had but never got enough of, as it is for the love we might have had, but never quite found.
I think I'll be mourning the loss of that potential, unrendered love for the rest of my life.
EV | 12/21/2025
Today is the winter solstice. It also marks five years without my dad. My grief has been an odd and slowly emerging thing, in many ways, taking a while to fully settle in. I think losing someone at the height of COVID, before there were any vaccines even...