“Your dad is dead!” I remember the statement so vividly. I remember the looks on everyone’s faces. I remember it all like it was yesterday. I was nine when my world spiraled out of control. My dad decided to take himself out of the world and leave us behind. He was in a lot of pain, and he didn’t know what to do with it. At first alcohol was his answer to the pain; but in the end it just left him hurting more than anything else. Things weren’t always miserable in our house. There were plenty of good times that definitely helped to compensate for the bad. We had a good life. Things may not have always been the easiest, but it still wasn’t terrible. When things started going downhill, they went downhill fast; our lives went from seemingly fine,
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But how could I believe those words when he was the one who made the decision to leave? For a long time I couldn’t. I knew he loved me, and I knew he cared, but I didn’t understand why he would want to give up. There was a hole in my life and in my heart. At such a young age, I didn’t really understand the effects that my dad’s actions would have on me. It took me years to start to grasp the truth of what happened fully. As I got older I started to blame myself and over analyze things, “If I would have said goodbye to him… If I would have told him I loved him before I left for practice, then maybe he wouldn’t have done it” Those thoughts clouded my head and my heart for the longest time, and even today they still slip through the cracks. Mary Oliver’s Poem “A Bitterness” really stood out to me in so many ways when I first read it. So many parts reminded me of him. Specifically, when the narrator said, “I believe you were cheated. I believe your best friends were loneliness and misery. I believe your busiest enemies were anger and depression” (786 – 787). It struck a chord with me because in his world his best friends (loneliness and misery) were his cigarettes and his vodka. I feel like if he would have kept trying, and maybe even tried harder then he wouldn’t have been cheated out of his life so early. I understand that he did try to quit. He tried his hardest and it wasn’t enough. I feel like I’m being entirely selfish when I say that I just wish that I wouldn’t have been cheated out of a father so early in life. He was in so much pain, and suicide was his only way out. As it’s said by many, “At least he’s no longer
But how could I believe those words when he was the one who made the decision to leave? For a long time I couldn’t. I knew he loved me, and I knew he cared, but I didn’t understand why he would want to give up. There was a hole in my life and in my heart. At such a young age, I didn’t really understand the effects that my dad’s actions would have on me. It took me years to start to grasp the truth of what happened fully. As I got older I started to blame myself and over analyze things, “If I would have said goodbye to him… If I would have told him I loved him before I left for practice, then maybe he wouldn’t have done it” Those thoughts clouded my head and my heart for the longest time, and even today they still slip through the cracks. Mary Oliver’s Poem “A Bitterness” really stood out to me in so many ways when I first read it. So many parts reminded me of him. Specifically, when the narrator said, “I believe you were cheated. I believe your best friends were loneliness and misery. I believe your busiest enemies were anger and depression” (786 – 787). It struck a chord with me because in his world his best friends (loneliness and misery) were his cigarettes and his vodka. I feel like if he would have kept trying, and maybe even tried harder then he wouldn’t have been cheated out of his life so early. I understand that he did try to quit. He tried his hardest and it wasn’t enough. I feel like I’m being entirely selfish when I say that I just wish that I wouldn’t have been cheated out of a father so early in life. He was in so much pain, and suicide was his only way out. As it’s said by many, “At least he’s no longer