2 Year Old Experience Take 2

It’s been 2 plus years ago since we honored and interned my father-in-love. To say the least, this has been a very different 2 years. I have been trying to live life knowing that dad, or pops as I called him, will never be a physical presence in my life or the life of my family again. Opportunities to call him when having to make major or critical decisions are no more. I’ll just have to remember the wisdon he did share with me and remember the principles he used in making critical decisions. Calling to check on mom still feels a bit strange, at times, in that I know dad will not be answering the phone. In the past, you could almost count on dad to answer most of the time when he was home. When talking to mom you can hear the lonliness in her voice.  The  quivering, the sniffling, the tentiveness it’s still there, although it’s starting to fade, which is a healthy thing.  Dad’s passing, is staring to set in for us all, which is also healthy.  We’ve moved beyond cognitive recognition of the fact that’s he’s gone.  We now live on the wind of his memory. We know now that he won’t be starting his car anytime soon.  Nor will he be tramping through the garage after checking around the apartments.  Interestingly enough though after 2 years I can still see him lying in the casket. Yes I said casket.  Having the body present during the funeral is common in the black family/church experience.  You don’t see many, if any, funeral services without the body lying in state.  Somehow being able to view the body after the eulogy gave things a sense of finality.  And not just for our immediate family.  Our distant relatives and friends desire that sense of finality as well.  The opportunity to say that last goodbye serves as an entrée to a healed future.  Back to what I was saying, after 2 years I can still see him lying in the casket and in a strange sort-of-way looking better in his death state than he did in his last living days because of the effects the cancer had on his body. However, even though outwardly he was perishing, inwardly he was strong. All during his sickness he continued to encourage us and others. It was really remarkable to watch him. We all knew that the six months the doctors gave him to live would come sooner than any of us wanted it to. But dad was prepared and did not, at least in our presence, let it bother him. Knowing that he had lived a good life he was ready, we just were not. If I could live the balance of my life the way he lived his last months I will have a great life. One thing don’t want to live with, but  will have to since I have no choice in the matter, is the fact that Andrea’s and my 4 year old grandson, Zion Prince Jalil Drake, will  have to grow up not knowing the man that has meant so much to me, his great grandfathe Hollie. This will be similar to our son’s Rigael and Terren who grew up not knowing my mother, Naomi Faye, who died at the young age of 39 as a heroine addict.  But that means I will have to love and nurture Zion in ways reminescent of Roy Dean Hollie, Sr and Naomi Faye Drake.  They both knew how to love others.