Keep On Keepin' On
Most people called you Duke but I got to call you DaddyO. Even though I was somewhat awkward and quite uncool growing up, there was never a doubt in my mind that you were the coolest dad on earth. I wore it like a badge of honor and loved to tell everyone that you were mine. You were tall, dark, and handsome, smoked Kool Mild cigarettes, and always knew how to dress. You had a special strut when you wore your leather jacket and spoke in a smooth, deep voice. When you worked you drove a big red boom truck, wore a “dew rag” and painter overalls, and never took your gold herringbone chain off, even when you worked all day long through the grueling heat of summer. You drank Pepsi and drove a Corvette and always bought mom roses when she got mad at you. You called her Hollywood and would bring her home licorice just to make her smile. Brandon and I would always catch you guys in the kitchen kissing. She made your eyes squint and your mouth would curve a special way when you smiled at her. You took us to Pannekoeken for pancakes on Sunday mornings and surprise trips to Valleyfair and Wisconsin Dells just to hear us squeal. You worked and worked and worked and you never complained. You never wanted us to feel one moment of the discomfort you lived growing up poor, so you gave us everything. You dreamed for us and with us. You imagined a life for us and made it a reality. You were proud. You were wise. You shared your heart and your words and we listened and hung on every syllable. We watched you dream, invent, tell your stories, and never ever give up. When we would complain about how hard something was or think we couldn’t do it you would gently say with a smile “ain’t nothin’ to it but to do it.” These words of yours are gold and they carry me through my days. When I am so lost for you I don’t know what to do I just listen to you speak it in my mind. I hear your voice and I center myself. You remind me to breathe and tell myself, “I got this.”
“Don’t Worry Be Happy” played on repeat in my head the day that you died. The details hurt too much to remember clearly but that stands out most in my memories of that day. Sometimes I think that was you trying your hardest to protect me from the pain of losing you and doing your best to help me through the hardest moment of my life. It kept me standing on my legs. It kept breath in my body. It allowed my heart to keep beating.
We all deal with grief and loss in different ways. I won’t lie. There are times when I just want to be angry at everyone who still has a dad and envy them standing in the Father’s Day card aisle when I have to keep walking on. But my dad didn’t raise me to be bitter or envious. He taught me that life can be rough, like real rough. There are days when you don’t know what to do with anything but as he would always say, “you just have to keep on keepin’ on.” He would tell me to enjoy it when it’s good and learn from it when it’s hard. It’s all temporary Sweet Pea. I wish I could tell him that I get it now. I am learning that I don’t have to try to be so perfect and make everybody happy. You never asked me to keep my feet on the ground and always reminded me that the sky was definitely the limit. This life can be whatever we make it to be and as long as the sun keeps rising we keep trying.
In a blink here we are at the four year mark. So much has happened while you’ve been away. I can’t believe I managed through it without your voice, your hugs, and your wisdom. But I carry all of those things with me every day so I guess I haven’t really been without you at all. As this day approaches each year we all struggle with how to name this day we recognize as the day you left us. For a while we called it your "death day" or "D day" but that just didn't sit with any of us and didn't really seem like your style. Since we still feel you around us all the time and celebrate all that you were and continue to be to us, we chose to rename it your Ascend Day.
Ascend
to move, climb, or go upward; mount; rise: to rise to a higher point, rank, or degree; proceed from an inferior to a superior degree or level:
to go toward the source or beginning; go back in time.
to gain or succeed to; acquire:
Sometimes I sit back and set up fictional scenarios of you having conversations with the boys now and how it would look for you and Rocky to shoot the breeze out in the driveway like you always used to. Jameson’s deep voice now resembles your cool mumble and I have a hard time making out his sentences on the phone just like I did whenever you’d call me. Presley is going to be two next month and you would fall madly in love with his little Virgo personality. When I catch the profile of his face from a distance I can see your face in him. Dakotah has your swagger when he walks and Kellan carries the same mysteries you do in your eyes. I have aged. Life is written all over my face and I feel life racing behind me. I can’t quiet my screaming passions anymore. I am embracing my imperfection and my unique voice as a woman, mother, and human. I am the combination of so many things that life has thrown my way and I am trying to give them some shape. I want to sit outside with you and tell you about my dreams and ambitions while you smoke a cigarette and smile with quiet pride, but life doesn’t always give us what we want. While I yearn to hear your voice tell me all those things that make me feel like I matter in this world, I can hear it in my heart and as long as it keeps beating I will keep on keepin’ on.
See you later alligator.
