Celebrating Father’s Day with 3 unique stories that encapsulate the essence of a child’s relationship with him. One of the most touching relationships, it is also often blemished with complexities, miscommunication, and fumbling awkwardness, but despite all the challenges and confrontations (or lack thereof) love overcomes every obstacle.
Read Part 1 here: Father’s Day, Part 1: Son’s First Recital
Part 2: Letting Go
This is a heartfelt note, dedicated to a father, by an emotional daughter, who is currently sitting alone in a coffin-like room, spacious and grand, but somehow suffocating like you needed to count your breaths.
Kind of like a classroom on the first day of school. The little girl was a sobbing mess, clinging to her father’s knee, soaking it wet with warm tears. She didn’t know how to let go that day, or the next, and although she admits she grew out of it, she never really got used to saying goodbye.
She only came to this realization when she got a new job, thousands of miles away in a new city, one she had only visited on a vacation with family. She was bright-eyed and excited, nothing like her first day of school; but when the time came for the final hug goodbye, she felt like clinging to her father’s knees once again, overcome with sadness and an unrecognizable feeling, akin to loneliness.
Letting go is hard. It is now evident that I struggle with it. That’s why I’m penning down this letter, to make this process easier for someone else. That someone is waiting outside the door for me, trying to be discrete, but his heavy breathing and tearful sighs give away his ordeal. I know this feeling all too well, but this time leaving is a little too permanent. A little too real. Maybe it’s the letter that makes it so real, or the grandeur of this room; it could also be the muffled wedding music filtering in through the wooden door, or the intricately stitched dress my father bought me for this occasion. It’s time I end my note to this special someone. I may be old enough to walk my own kids to their classrooms today, but when times are testing, I’d still cling to your knees if I could.
