Not all stories have happy endings

Grief is an odd thing — it has no basis in nature, no primal reason for being. Other emotions make sense with our biology: Fear keeps us from danger, pain warns us of injury, friendship and love keep us together in groups and social settings. (After all, there’s safety in numbers.)

But there is no reason for grief, except to remind us that what we once loved … is gone.

My father died 204 days ago.

I measure it in days, because it’s the first thing I think of when I wake up in the morning. I’ve been doing it since it happened. “Dad’s been gone a day. Dad’s been gone two days. Dad’s been gone three days …” When I hit seven, and I said to myself “Dad’s been gone a week,” I freaked out. So I stopped measuring it in weeks, and later, months. I stuck with days.

Two hundred and four days without a phone call. Two hundred and four days without hearing his laugh. Two hundred and four days that I’ve watched the world just keep spinning on without him, as if he was never here.

How dare it.

It seems to me when people talk about grief, they tend to focus on the softer emotions like sadness and loss. And while I do feel those, if I’m being completely honest, mostly what I feel is anger.

I’m angry at the paramedics for not instantly appearing after I called 911. I’m angry at the oak door for being so hard to break down. I’m angry that when the coroner came out, she had a pink sparkly jacket on.

Mostly, I’m angry at myself. I’m angry at myself for not making him go to the doctor. I’m angry at myself for being in the kitchen and not noticing when he got up from bed. I’m angry with myself for not being better at CPR. I’m angry at myself for telling the paramedics it was OK to stop when they told me he was gone.

In one instant, my house was turned from a loving, family home to nothing more than the place where my Dad died. I see the floor outside the room where they worked on him and there’s no indication anything ever happened there. It’s just a hallway I have to walk down everyday. But every time I do, all I can think is “my Dad died right here.”

He is everywhere in my mind, and nowhere to be found.

His absence is suffocating.

This weekend was Father’s Day and I had been absolutely dreading it. My friends warned me to stay off social media, that it was likely to stir up a whole slew of memories and emotions. So, to avoid getting swamped down in my grief, I kept myself busy and avoided my phone. I ran errands, started a painting project and cooked my husband’s favorite meal.

All was going fine until that evening. It was quiet, the boys were in bed, dinner was finished and I was foolishly headed towards the wrong end of a bottle of merlot. All those feelings I had buried throughout the day were starting to claw their way back to the surface and I stepped out into our backyard because I felt like I was really about to lose it. But just before I did — right when that ball of grief was so big in my chest it was about to burst — I smelled him.

The scent only lasted a second or two, but it was very real — that combination of soap, cigarettes and cooking oil I had smelled a thousand times on his work shirts when I was a little girl — and that ball in my chest melted away.

I’m not a particularly spiritual or a prayerful woman — never have been. I believe in what I can see and touch. I believe in what science tells me is true, I believe in what I can prove. But in that moment, in those brief seconds as that familiar scent washed over me, I almost believed in impossible things.

Almost.

Was it the stress of the day? Maybe. Was it the wine? Probably. Was it a daughter’s grief bubbling over until her brain whipped up the most comforting thing it could conjure? Most likely.

But maybe the “whys” and “hows” don’t matter. Not really.

If you’re waiting for me to tell you that since that night everything has seemed a little brighter, I’m afraid you’ve missed the point. Remember, there is no logic behind grief, you can’t measure or make sense of it. It ebbs and flows according to it’s own wishes, swooping up at you when you least expect it, and then abandoning you without notice.

Like a scent on the breeze, 204 days later.