Reflections - cover2
Selected Writings & Artwork by Harriett Copeland Lillard
Selected Writings & Artwork by Harriett Copeland Lillard
You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
Diary 1978-1981<br />
Death of Papa<br />
August 1979<br />
Papa<br />
My stepfather died a month ago. It has been a difficult month. Many<br />
memories have flooded my thoughts daily, nightly, constantly, of times<br />
past never to be recalled, never to be experienced again. A terrible<br />
emptiness and longing for things to be as they were a year ago, a feeling<br />
that life will never be quite as good, as full, again. It was so fast that we<br />
didn’t have time to adjust to the thought of his being dead, before it<br />
actually happened. But that is selfishness on our part – such a blessing<br />
for him not to have suffered – yet I still listen for his whistle at the gate<br />
and think, “I better ask Papa about that,” at least a half dozen times each<br />
day. I was not ready for him to go.<br />
Mother’s phone call and my mad dash to the store filled with cold<br />
apprehension in the August heat, my voice screaming soundlessly inside<br />
my head, “No! No! This cannot be!" Each moment is etched forever in<br />
my memory like a movie re-running constantly. He looked like he<br />
was asleep in his chair near the front door of the store watching a golf<br />
tournament on TV. But there was no doubt. The look of death was upon him. My scalp prickled with the sensation of his still being there<br />
– his spirit was very close. My husband felt it too and would not leave him – it was as if we were experiencing our last communication<br />
with him.<br />
Through all the ensuing confusion of ambulance attendants, sheriff, police, Justice of the Peace – we stayed there with him. I placed my<br />
hand on his bald head in my old gesture of affection. As I always did when leaving him sitting there and said, “Bye Papa, see you later.”<br />
He was not yet cold, only clammy, still damp from perspiration. It had been terribly hot that day. They came to take him away and the<br />
spell was broken – he was gone, body and spirit. We turned to leave, locking the door behind us – I saw through the glass his hat lying<br />
there next to his chair. I left it.<br />
Now the ordeal truly began. The ordeal of telling the children, hysterical crying, endless streams of people and telephone calls, my<br />
mother’s stricken exhausted face, the helpless feeling of being tired without having done anything, wondering how we will be able to get<br />
through the next few days graciously and with some degree of dignity.<br />
60