Losing My Dad Helped Me Become A Better Man, But That Doesn’t Mean I Like It

Originally published in 2014.

It’s been eight years. Is that right? Eight years? Has it really been that long? My dad has been gone eight years now.

It’s probably bad to say, but I don’t think about him much anymore. It’s become a normal thing that he’s not around and honestly the only reason I remember how long it’s been since he died is because we buried him on Good Friday — something my brother, sister and I fought against for this very reason…we didn’t want an easy reminder of the day we said goodbye.

You could say that it’s sad I don’t think about him much anymore, but I think the sadder thing would be to live in the past and lament the fact that he’s not here.

Move on and live your life. That’s what he would’ve wanted.

His death made me think harder about the value of relationships in my life; about what it means to be a good husband, son, brother, father and friend — because frankly, he was very far from perfect at any of those. But I wanted to be better at all of them because that’s what he always pushed me to do — and it’s made me a better man because of it.

I wrote everything I needed to write about him four years ago. One day I’ll probably want to write more, but for now, I think the piece below, which I wrote in April 2010, communicates how I still feel about my dad’s death. I just don’t feel it as often.

I still think he died too soon. When I wrote this, he’d already missed my wedding, which is sad because everybody got super drunk and I feel like he would’ve found that very entertaining.

I was also sad he’d never meet my kids — something I’m still very sad about because my two girls are both pretty awesome.

And when I wrote this, I was sad he’d never get to help me renovate my first house…but the joke’s on you, 29 year-old Justin! You still rent at 34, you shithead!

So for now, the words I wrote in 2010 still speak for the way I feel about losing my pops, and I’ve republished them below. They’re honest, sad, slightly humorous, and will depress you if you let them.

Don’t.

I had such a good dad that even eight years later I don’t really want to think about the fact that he’s not around.

That’s a very good thing.

__________________________________________________

Originally written April 2, 2010.

Four years ago today, my Dad died.

Technically, he died on April 10, but we buried him on Good Friday, thus forever cementing it in my mind as “the day my Dad died.”

I’ve tried to put memories of it out of my mind, but that’s not something you can just erase — -especially when you have a yearly reminder. April 10 can come and go without anyone noticing, but Good Friday is pretty hard to miss.

It happened suddenly on a Monday morning. Doctors called it a “massive myocardial infarction”, a soulless medical term for a fatal heart attack. I would later overhear people throughout the week say things like, “he did have a pacemaker” and “heart disease does run in their family.” It was as if those statements would in some way justify the sudden death of an otherwise healthy 62 year old man.

My sister called me seven times that morning. I was on a conference call at work and the first three times I saw her number on the caller ID, I thought it could wait. The next three, I worried that someone might have died. On the seventh, I picked up.

“Dad’s had a heart attack and they’re working to revive him now.”

Ten minutes later, she called back.

“He didn’t make it.”

He didn’t make it. Four years later, those words still burn the back of my neck.

My soon-to-be wife and I flew to Memphis early Tuesday morning to help with funeral preparations. There was a brief glimmer of brightness when we stepped off the plane to beautiful, sunny Southern weather — -a stark contrast from the gloom of early-Spring in Chicago. It was as if we were there on vacation. But the moment of brightness was merely that. A moment, whisked away by cruel reality.

“I’m so sorry, Justin,” my Uncle Mike said when I walked through the door of their home. “I need you to write your Daddy’s obituary so we can get it in the paper tomorrow.”

How do you sum up the life of one of your heroes when they charge per word? Something about being a father of three, grandfather of five, brother, son, carpenter, fisherman, friend, coworker. Facts. Just the bare-bones facts.

Everyone told me how beautifully written it was, but to me, it all felt so marginal and formulaic. I wasn’t writing about the man I knew, I was listing out the occupations he held. Brother, son, father, coworker — -these were just roles he played in life. They certainly didn’t define who he was as a person.

What I really wanted to write was:

Bill Allen died suddenly and without warning on Monday, April 10, 2006. He was 62 and it was too fucking soon. His family didn’t even get to say goodbye.

He was kind and quiet around strangers, jovial and occasionally outspoken around family. He rarely cursed, but when he did, you knew he meant business. He laughed because something was funny, not because everyone else was laughing. He spoke to his kids, never at them. He fought for what he believed in.

He made mistakes. He used those mistakes to teach his kids to be better than him. He let his pride get the best of him from time to time. He apologized. He worried. He was human.

He was a good man, a great father and meant the world to his family, particularly his youngest son. He will be missed.

Beyond that, the week was a surreal blur, crowded with family and friends I hadn’t seen in 20 years (or ever). When a loved one dies, people around you justify their death by assuring you that they lived a full life and they’re in better place now. This has always puzzled me.

I was 25 years old, engaged, childless and renting an apartment when my Dad died. It might be selfish, but had he lived a full life, he would’ve been at my wedding, met my kids and helped me renovate a bathroom or two in my first house.

Instead, I lit a candle next to his picture at my wedding. And when I have kids, they’ll only hear funny stories about their Dad’s Dad. And while his tools will be present when I’m knocking ill-advised holes in drywall and accidentally cutting out load-bearing beams underneath staircases of my first home, he will not.

These are rude reminders that he’s gone, but occasionally, as I’ve found over the past four years, there are humorous ones: when the Bears beat the Saints in the 2007 NFC Championship game, I instinctively texted my Dad’s number, “Can you believe it, Dad? Our Bears are SB bound!”

The response was immediate and hilarious: “wrong number I aint yo dad bitch”.

No, I suppose you’re not.

Over time, I’ve found that you learn to deal with the permanent physical absence of a loved one. It becomes okay to talk about them without getting sad, to write about them without the concern that you’re going to depress people. Holidays and family gatherings slowly get easier and instead of wallowing in sadness, you recount stories, memories and lessons you learned from them with fondness and nostalgia.

Stories like the time he and I went backpacking in Shawnee National Forest, where my rock climbing career began and ended when I got stuck halfway up a rock wall, and he had to climb up and rescue me.

“What’d you learn here?” He was constantly teaching.
“That I’m really weak!”
“Would you do it again?”
“Maybe if I was stronger.”
“Well now you know what it’s going to take to climb it.”

Or like the day he taught me what it means to be a real sports fan:

“Once you choose your team, you stick with ‘em, son. Even the worst teams will come around one day, and when they do, you’ll enjoy winning that much more.”

A lesson that has served me well for many, many years as a Chicago Cubs fan.

Or like the time I wrecked his truck while goofing off and he got so mad when I brought it home that he threw his keys into a ditch across the street. We spent nearly two hours looking for his keys in silence until I finally felt compelled to break it:

“So…uh, Dad, what’d you learn here?”

A joke he would greatly appreciate later, but it didn’t do me any favors at the time.

So while Good Friday will forever be a reminder of the day I buried my Dad, I try not to linger too long on those thoughts. It’s the life of someone that truly defines us; not the death. Besides, my Dad wouldn’t have wanted it that way.