I have a good reason to dislike February. 7 years ago I learned that my dad that I had finally gotten back in touch with and was going to visit again had cancer....
On leap day, Feb. 29, 2000 he died with me ever having hugged him since my senior year (10 years ago).
I didn't talk to him for 3 years because of something petty. I thought he hadn't come to my graduation. Then he skipped town and wrote to me while I was in college. I didn't write back becuase I was angry.
After moving to CA and starting to miss him I sent him a Christmas card in 1999. It came back to me with a different address and so I sent it on. After another two weeks he got it and called me right away.
I realized how much I missed him that Jan. 12th. He told me that the best gift he received that year was my card with my phone number.
You see, when I was 3 my mother divorced my dad, Jim, and remarried my legal father, Ed. My dad thought it would be best for me to grow up with Ed as my father. So he legally gave up all claims to me as his daughter. I grew up and I still call Ed "Daddy".
I met Jim again when I was young and wanted to know. Legally I wasnt supposed to have contact with him till I was 18. I'm glad I didn't wait.
Jim came to live with my mom and my brother and i long after she left daddy and stayed with us for a year. I still have video of him at the New Year's Party we threw.
Then the whole graduation thing happened and I didn't talk to him again.
After he died I couldn't go to the funeral. I sang Amazing Grace for him in front of my choir at the time he was being buried. It was all I could offer.
I learned a year later that he had indded come to my graduation. He hadn't said anything or come to hug me because Daddy was there and he didn't want to cause a scene as I was only 16.
I hated myself then, knowing that he had come and I simply thought he didn't...I never even asked him.
It's the one greatest regret in my life so far.
I still can hear him, 7 years later, saying on the other end of the phone line, "Hey sweetheart. How's my little girl today?"
I miss him more than I'll ever be able to explain.
And yet, he died on leap day so I don't even have a single day every year that I can cry. Just once every 4 years which I'm sure was a great joke of his. So I cry for two days in between.
I've upload some scans of some old photos.
He's gone. But I still miss him.
I love you, Dad.
