Hi everyone! It’s Melinda. Welcome to Melinda’s Grief Corner! MGC comes out twice a month on Sundays. If this is your first time here, be sure to check out past posts to learn more about the inspiration behind this new Article Club feature and read about other grief-y topics I’ve covered with resources I’ve shared!
I have absolutely no recollection of Father’s Day last year.
It was the first one after my dad died and I think my mom and I decided we weren’t going to do anything. And I don’t think we did. My dad liked to grill on Father’s Day and he always got a small present - he wasn’t a huge gift person, he felt like he had everything he needed - which was normally another baseball cap or socks because his feet were always cold. I’m certain we didn’t grill and I’m pretty certain we didn’t leave the house.
But I feel like I can’t escape this Father’s Day. It is EVERYWHERE. The grocery store has a section of cards and BBQ supplies for dad. The hardware store has grills on sale for Father’s Day. My inbox has been flooded with emails about every single Father’s Day sale going on in the entire world. And every time I open up Amazon and put something in my cart I get a little highlight telling me “this will arrive x number of days before Father’s Day” like this impending countdown of dread and doom.
So dear reader, consider this my response to all of that absolute mayhem of reminders that have compounded my dread of this day. Because, we the grieving, have a range of feelings about this day (or maybe not! Whatever you feel is valid). And I don’t need more flashy reminders that my dad won’t be here this Father’s Day.
I’ve compiled not one, not two, but three resources for today in different formats that will hopefully support you in however you need to be supported today.
The first is a book by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie titled Notes on Grief. It’s a short and powerful read about the death of her father that occurred during the height of the COVID pandemic (her father did not die from COVID, but it impacted her ability to travel to her family when he did pass). When I started re-reading this book after my dad died, I highlighted so many lines that there are probably more highlighted sentences than there are non-highlighted sentences.
The second is an article by one of my friends, Ben Myers, about the last lesson his father taught him. It’s deeply personal and yet also universal I feel in terms of what we take and carry after our loved ones pass. Ben is a beautiful writer and this article captures both the sorrow and the love that define grief.
And lastly, a clip of an interview between Anderson Cooper and Stephen Colbert about how we don’t talk about grief in loss in our U.S. culture and Stephen’s reflections on the loss of his father and brothers early in his life. It is a conversation that is vulnerable and feels deeply connected and one that I have watched dozens of times over the past year.
Last thing, dear reader! I want this to be a space for you to honor your dad, grandad, father-figure, whoever it was in your life that you lost that felt like a father to you. If you’re open to it, drop their name in the comments. It can be their first name, initials, or nickname. Whatever feels best for you. I believe it’s important to continue to say (and in this case, write) the names of those we’ve lost to remember they lived, they were and are loved, and we continue to carry them with us.
I’ll go first - Ricardo Montilde Lim.
Super big hugs today to you, dear reader.
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