So sorry to hear of your loss. I hope you can remember the good times and forgive the bad ones and honor him in the ways that feel right.

I lost my Dad in October, at age 69, and it was rather sudden. I was in the hospital room when he died. I am still very sad about it. It is really unpredictable, the moments I think of him, the way my thoughts turn to him from seemingly-unrelated things.

Dad and I had our tough times but in recent years I was seeing more of him and Mom and we seemed to have finally formed a truce. At least things were better than they had been between us. I cannot imagine losing a parent from whom one is completely estranged.

My brother and sister spread some of his ashes on Opening Day of fishing season, April 1st but I could not be there. I guess my dad was part of that tradition in that spot, every year the local anglers would remember any of their own who had passed that year. I am keeping his gardening spirit alive, and planting two apple trees in his honor. Sometimes these gestures help to make sense of such a primal, unavoidable event.