The last Japanese iris of the season just bloomed, its form skewed slightly sideways from all the other blooms that rose and bloomed before it. A tinge of sadness accompanied the end of this plant’s bloom – it started its banner show on Father’s Day – our first Father’s Day without Dad. When they bloomed I took that as a hello from him on a day that I needed so badly to hear from him in some way. Mom wasn’t feeling well that day, so we didn’t do our usual Sunday dinner at home – instead, I dropped off some food to her and made a short visit to the cemetery.
It’s strange, but so far I haven’t really felt my Dad’s presence at the cemetery. If he is there, it’s at the bottom of the little hill where his site is, far from his columbarium and in a quieter space where the manicured lawn blends into a patch of wilderness. There, wild roses bloomed, their perfume lending a charm to the little bend of the smallest stream that goes almost dormant in a dry summer. Later, goldenrod and purple asters will nod in unison at the autumnal breeze. In the soft mossy ground beneath an old evergreen, a little place of respite exists, and if my father is present there at all, that’s where I feel him – but it’s faint, like the memories I have of his early days in that beautiful section of town. Obviously, I don’t have anything real or substantial as I wasn’t born then, but somehow I feel those days, from the way Mom speaks of them, and from his own stories, faded and faint.
On Father’s Day, I wanted a quiet moment with Dad, but it was not to be found at the cemetery. Foolishly, I hadn’t counted on others being around, but of course they were there, and my preference for grieving has always been one of solitude. I briefly got out of the car and paused before Dad’s name, then I got back in and drove to our childhood church. It was later in the afternoon, and St. Mary’s was already closed and locked. Still needing some time with him, I drove over to St. Mary’s hospital, remembering a day when I was sick at school and Dad had to pick me up. He brought me to the hospital where he was working, and let me stay in a room right off of the cafeteria. A nun would pop in to check on me as Dad finished his operations for the day, and he would check on me too, asking how I was – trying to figure out if my sickness was physical or emotional. Back then, it was a combination of the two – stomach problems coupled with an extreme and undiagnosed social anxiety that left me terrified of being in school with other kids. I remember feeling the inability to explain what I was going through, as much as I felt his frustration swaddled with compassion for his first-born son’s string of sicknesses, and whatever mental state I had gotten myself into that made the school call him from the hospital to pick me up.
I wanted to see if the room was still there.
I wanted to see if my Dad was still there.
I knew he wasn’t, but there was a little spark of comfort to think of how many hours my father spent in those hallways, the crappy sandwiches he got at the vending machine, the laughter he brought out from all the nurses. I found the room – at least I think it was the room – but it was locked. And that’s how it should be. Some doors to the past aren’t meant to be opened – they are designed to exist only in the past, and to open that door today in that day would only be disappointing. It would only have been empty.
My father would not be there.
Instead, I feel him in the last iris of the season, the way I felt him in the first bloom. He is there in the unforced times when he visits to let me know he is still here. It doesn’t always come on days designated for fathers, and it won’t find resolution or ending when this first year without him finishes next month.
