Yesterday I found out my father died last September

[EFerrari]

and none of his five halfwit adult brats had the decency to tell me he was ill, let alone, that he was gone. My father and I were close and that would have made him furious.

I managed to find the obit and the notice at the funeral home. Smiled because instead of flowers, he asked for donations to DU -- Ducks Unlimited. lol

My dad could charm the socks off a snake. He's about the most social person I ever met. He loved the art of the deal and he loved the outdoors. For all that, he had a hyper sensitivity when it came to other people that must have been hard to live with. He had life long depression which always seemed to me a way to defend against that sensitivity. I don't know if he ever graduated from college but his interests were wide ranging and active. In our infrequent visits, we'd find a good restaurant with a decent bar and hunker down to shoot the breeze for hours. That and long rides. He used to take me up and down back roads no matter what part of the country we happened to be in.

My boys and I went to visit him out in Missouri about 12 years ago. His wife hated it but we didn't stay with them. We had him for a couple of days and it was really good for him to see those tall guys that each look like him in a different way. I look more like Dad than any of the others, he said it was like looking in a mirror.

I didn't even meet him until I was seven but we took to each other instantly. His brother is out here in the East Bay. Have to call him today. I'm really hating time and distance today. He lived so far away, being his daughter was like being a visitor in my own life. And this time thing, well, it's just got to stop.

[elleng]

1. ...

:hug:

[EFerrari]

2. Mom tried to call him yesterday and got someone else.

She came in and told me while I was making dinner and my hands and feet and brain just went numb. (Now we know I can cook on auto pilot.) Today it feels like someone is chewing on my insides. Oh, boy.

I don't even know if there's a grave. When my frontal lobes light up again, maybe I can call the furneral people and find out.

[Forkboy]

3. Well that sucks.

I'm sorry. :hug:

[EFerrari]

4. I called the cemetery and they're going to send me a picture

of his grave when the weather straightens out. Memorial Day is coming up, too, so it might be a week or so.

Between talking to the funeral guys and the cemetery lady, I can hear the gossip phonetree lighting up from here. Good. WTH were those neckless monsters thinking, anyway.

[Forkboy]

5. I stopped trying to figure out the ways of the family unit long ago.

It's like trying to solve a Rubik's Cube blindfolded.

[EFerrari]

6. That's the only way. And why I love dogs so much.

:)

[HereSince1628]

7. My father was dead over three years when I found out.

Sometimes the odd-one-out means really being left out of the loop.

[EFerrari]

8. As he grew more dependent on his kids, it was harder to call

without feeling like I was intruding somehow because they were around more. We emailed for a while but that went downhill in the last few years because his access seemed to be spotty. I haven't been diligent, either, in the last two years. I could have done better.

[mopinko]

9. that's a drag.

:hug: to you and your mom. sorry that it was such bs.
families! :crazy:

[EFerrari]

10. Families may be better in theory.

Now I understand why there are so many comedies that use a funeral as the occasion. Yesterday, I think Mom told my uncle that she suspects my inheritance has been stolen from me, lol. And then she told me that she carefully prepared my brother before she told him. Of course, she just blurted it out to me and John was my father, not my brother's father. lol

[AngryOldDem]

11. You're not alone.

My condolences on the loss of your father.

Around Christmas I found out my mom died when the florist called to ask what to do with some poinsettias that my ex had sent her from the kids. The people next door told the delivery man that she was dead. My sister, for whom the description "raving bitch" is an extreme compliment, didn't bother to get in touch. (I am out of town but there were ways she could have found me, had she so chose.)

Sister did, however, manage to get my daughter's address at college (don't ask me how) because my mom had willed a piece of jewelry to her. In a note with the necklace, it turned out my mom died in October after being ill for a good part of last year. Sounds like either a stroke, or dementia.

My mom and I were not close by any stretch, but it really rankles not to have known.

I am now officially DONE with my family.


(I used to post in this forum a while back...this is not just a "hit and run.")

[EFerrari]

12. I'm sorry, AngryOldDem.

In our case, I always tried to avoid intruding on that family so, Dad and I would visit or talk before or after holidays, that kind of thing. I sent cards and letters to his office before he retired. As he needed their help more often, that meant they were around more and our windows shrank to almost nothing. The last time I called, it was a machine.


I can't imagine, if our positions were reversed, not calling them to tell them the news even if it was awkward. Whatever. They had their own grief, too, I guess. Their mother died about six years ago. I'm surprised Dad lasted this long without her, in a way.