His last words were written on a napkin

Last December, attendees were asked to bring a flower to your celebration of life. Mom had the idea to float them in the river after it was all done. Since you had also requested your ashes be spread in the river, she thought it would be pretty to do the two things together. Unfortunately, with all the legal hoops to jump through at the crematorium, the ashes weren’t ready by the time of your celebration — and my mom wasn’t ready to go get them. But the announcement had already been posted in your obituary, and people brought flowers anyway. We didn’t know what to do with them. It was a sweet gesture, but with all the hustle and bustle and emotions of the day, we never did anything with them. I drove to your house a few weeks afterward and found them all shoved together in a white trash bag, limp with sadness. They had been taken from nature too soon, deprived of oxygen, and were starting to mold.

I ripped the trash bag open and spread them out on the garage floor, letting them breathe. The next time I went to your house — which was now just mom’s house — she had put them in a reusable shopping bag. With time, the flowers had shrunk in size and had begun to dry out. The same was true for our grief.

We decided to spread your ashes in March, four months after your passing. But again, with all the hustle and bustle and emotions of the day, we forgot about the flowers. The next time I went to mom’s house, she asked me if we should just throw them away. She was beginning to get her life back together, and couldn’t deal with one more item on her to-do list. I understood that. But we would not be throwing these flowers away.

I now had the bag of flowers in the trunk of my car. Your ashes were in the river, and the flowers remained with me. I didn’t know what to do with them, so I carried them around with me. I brought them inside my Atlanta apartment and back out again; I drove them around the Southeast as I continued to find my way. They stayed with me, and eventually, I asked the boat captain from the day of the ashes — now my boyfriend — to take me back out in the boat to release them.

But the months passed, and our lives got in the way. It was now the end of summer, and being a person who has a place for everything and everything in its place, I was acutely aware of this extra baggage in my trunk. It did not belong there. I decided that we were nearing the one-year anniversary of your death, and that this would be the right time to finally place the flowers in the river.

November arrived, and my boyfriend, Grey, picked me up from a dock on Spring Island where I was dogsitting for the weekend. I placed the bag of flowers in the center console as we untied the boat from the dock. I ran my fingers through the chilly water and thought of you. It was early — barely 8 am, and the river was calm. The crisp fall air felt nice, and I was thankful it was sunny. You never liked the clouds, but you did like the changing seasons. We cruised through the Lowcountry waterways until we reached the Beaufort River. We made the same route we did back in March, up to the downtown bridge. I asked Grey to slow down as we circled back. We neared the hospital where you were born, the bluff where we held your celebration of life, and finally, the house where you grew up. It was time.

Before we released the flowers though, I needed to open a message from my mom, one that she had sent me about a week ago. Apparently, she had just found a series of notes that you had written to each of us. They weren’t recent notes though. These notes were written 13 years ago, when you first became sick. You were in the hospital about to undergo open heart surgery, and I think you were scared you wouldn’t survive. You took a brown paper napkin, the kind you would find at a fast food restaurant like Wendy’s or Zaxby’s, and you unfolded it to write. It was fitting that you had written it on a napkin — you always had a stash of restaurant napkins in your pockets to scribble your calculations at the kitchen table, figuring out how to solve a problem, whether it was for work, woodworking, or the budget. On each of the four sections, there was a note with one of our initials on it. One to S, one to T, one to C, and one to All. You weren’t very good at expressing your emotions, and as I remember it 13 years ago, before you went into surgery, we hugged, but you didn’t seem scared. You only made jokes, which I found annoying. I didn’t see this part, but you passed Mom the napkin and told her only to read it if you didn’t make it.

Hours later, we were called back into one of the family conference rooms at MUSC, which made me nervous. In the movies, they only call you back if it’s bad news. We followed the surgeon back to the room, and I noticed blood spatter on his shoes. I didn’t know what to think. In the end, it was good news — you had survived the surgery and would make a full recovery. We were able to see you in recovery, and as you woke up, you were scared and fighting the intubation. I squeezed and rubbed your swollen feet, adjusting the ill-fitting yellow hospital socks with the anti-slip pads on the bottom. This was my first experience taking care of you. My hands were steady, but my heart was pounding. The nurses had me step out as they untubed you, as this could be traumatic for a young 18-year-old girl. Little did they know that this would just be the beginning of your twelve-year-long battle, and that this moment would be one of the very least traumatic moments I would witness along the way. Over the next twelve years, I would spend twenty nights with you in the hospital. You would ultimately meet your demise at the young age of 68.

Back at home, my mom had opened the napkin, unable to contain her curiosity. But my brother, Tucker, and I never saw it. Fast forward 13 years, right before the one-year anniversary of your death, she refound the napkin. She shared its contents with Tucker and me via text message, but I didn’t want to read it. I scrolled over the two photos Mom had shared with me, “S” and “All,” as described in her explanation (that I did read). These notes would be the very last thing I ever received from my father. I didn’t want to read them yet.

I later decided to read them for the first time out on the open water, in the boat with you by my side. I sat on the bow of the boat, and opened my note, To S, Love D. I was emotional at first, and then I started laughing. This note was actually pretty funny. I called Grey over to come laugh with me. You had said something in it that my mom thought would offend me, and it certainly would have offended me 13 years ago. But today, I found such joy in this semi-ridiculous goodbye note. It was so authentically you — dry, helpful, to the point — but with love. The type of love that was never spoken, and was only evident to those who really knew you and appreciated you for who you were. You were not perfect, and you probably could have written some nicer things, but I suppose in the end, that just wouldn’t have been very “you.”

I tried to read the “All” note too, but my mom had accidentally sent two copies of the “S” note, and I didn’t have a copy of the “All.” That was okay; this was good enough for me.

Now that I had read my note, I was ready to let you go, again. Like the ashes, I opened the bag of flowers and sifted through them with my hand. To my surprise, while most of the contents were brown, some of the flowers had retained their color. There were vibrant shades of purple and yellow among the dead. It showed me that there is always light in the darkness, but only if you seek it out. I could have easily just dumped the bag out and let it go; check it off my list. But I wanted, in my words, to find the goodness; to find the joy. I wanted, in your words (which I did not yet know), to find the positive and be thankful for it.

I took out a couple of the most beautiful flowers to take back home with me, and gradually let the rest go, by the handful. It was perfect. They were beautiful. All of your friends and family gave you these flowers, and one year later, you could finally receive their gifts. The flowers, like you, had finally returned to nature. As we neared the marina at the end of our trip, I held the bag upside down and sprinkled the remaining flower crumbs into the console of the boat. The boat that means so much to me, for many reasons, would now have a piece of you in it forever.

Later that day, I wrote:

One year ago today, I held your hand as you took your last breath. One year ago today, your twelve years of pain subsided.

One year ago today I did not have a clear path for my life. I was in a job that, for me, was a dead end. I was living in a city that, for me, was a dead end. I was hanging on to the threads of a dead-end relationship. And leading up to this day, I was worried about saving you, which for me, would eventually be a dead end.

Today, none of that is true. Today I have a clear path for my life. I am thankful to have a fulfilling job, home, and relationship. And I am not worried about you. You live in the Beaufort River, amongst all the wildlife and scenery that you loved. I can see you anytime I want. And today I had the honor of putting flowers on your grave.

Clemson won today, and you would’ve been there in the living room, bitching that they wanted to lose, because of the mistakes they made. Tucker, made the trip [for the game] though, so maybe you had a say in that win. He needed that.

As for me, I carry a miniature picture of you on my wrist. When I first got it, you could see the larger picture if you put it up to one eye and squinted just right, like a magnifying glass. I’ve worn it every day since then, and it’s since gotten cloudy. I can only see a blurry color of yellow when I look at the front of it now, but yesterday I discovered that if I turn it over, I can see the teeniest, tiniest picture of you, just as clear and as happy as ever. I needed that.

It makes me sad that our family unit has not molded into one. In the hospital, you had a clear picture that all of this would make our family stronger together. It has not, but you know just as well as I do that life is not perfect. If it were, you’d still be here.

A week later, I drove up to my mom’s house and asked for my note. I wanted to save it. Only then would I realize that they were all connected, like a little accordion of treasures. I read the contents of the other notes, including the “All” note. This note was spectacular.

I could picture you saying every word, in a slightly condescending tone, which was the tone you used when trying to motivate us. You didn’t mean it to be condescending; you were just matter-of-fact and when you saw a problem, you wanted to fix it. While it’s impossible to fix people, you have certainly motivated me to be the best person I can be, and also to fix any problem I see. Although the note was written many years ago, its message still rang true. You wrote this at the peak of your life, and it is such a special gift to be able to receive now, of all times.

I didn’t want to cut the napkin up into four parts; I thought it was cooler that they were all connected, just like you wanted our family unit to be. But out came the scissors, and I guess it’s for the best, as we’ve all gone our separate ways. We each live our own lives, but despite the distance, when each of us looks at our piece of the napkin, we cannot help but see it is connected to something bigger.

P.S. I promise I will start reading more for pleasure…