I look at this photograph taken on Christmas Eve and I now know it captured the moment before my life profoundly changed. I felt happy to be with my family and friends and was looking forward to spending the next few days with my parents. I was drinking champagne, appreciating all the Christmas decorations in the San Francisco restaurant we were dining in, and feeling the joys of the holiday season. And then the year turned. I remember going to the bank and asking the manager how she was...how the holidays were for her. She looked up at me with her pale face and sad eyes and told me how the year had already begun with illness and death in her family. I walked back to my car thinking I had escaped all of that for the moment and yet I had the very distinct feeling that I was on borrowed time.
I was...we all are. In two months, my father would die and I would become a different person.
Now, two more months have passed and I am learning to live with myself differently. I don't get to be my father's little girl any more--at least not in the physical realm. I miss her, I miss him and I miss the me I got to be when I was with him. Colors are so much brighter now and sounds louder. Feelings are stronger and yet my heart beats less confidently. Everything, everything is amplified by 10. I just want to be quiet. I want to be well. I wish I could reach out and touch my father and I wish I could reach in and find my former self.
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