It’s not something you ever think you’ll have to do. I mean you know you’ll do it eventually but most of your life you pretend that it’s forever away. You pretend that you’ll know when it happens. You pretend that they’ll be old and frail and you pretend that you’ll be grateful that the pain and oldness is over. But sometimes it doesn’t happen like that. Sometimes they disappear long before you want them to. He promised to call me in the morning. He promised that everything would be all right. But sometimes when the world has other plans for you – it rips the arse out of your nightie when you’re not looking – you have to just roll with what you’ve got.
He would hate the idea that I put this on the blog. The blog is supposed to be a place for funny anecdotes and stories lost in situations I somehow put myself in, but contrary to that belief, the blog is me. And if I know one thing about myself, I am me because of him. So Dad, regardless of how you’d feel about this – it’s going up. I said it out loud the day I put him in the ground. I said it to mum, our family and to every person we’ve ever met. I said it in front of Pastor Matthew, who was quite suprised I must say, and I said it because I meant it. So read it and then go hug your dad. Love him irrespective of the crap you wish he’d never given you and for the stuff he did. He’s all you’ve got and when he goes, hope to God that he knew you loved him for it.
Dad you said I was strong. You said I was stronger than you ever thought I could be, but today, I don’t think I am. Today you made me do something that I never thought I would have to do and like most things in my life, my expectations were just too high. I should have known that a heart that big and one that loved us that hard couldn’t last forever. You always said that that’s the way it should be – you said “you will put me in the ground my darling girl, and that’s the way it should be, never the other way round.” And like everything else you said, I should have listened.
My dad looked scary. He had long hair, a big beard and a giant gut. He wore biker boots to special occasions and believed that everyone deserved the same treatment irrespective of their social standing. I have no doubt that if he ever actually met the Queen and those people who were supposed to tell him how to greet her, he would have told them ‘Pigs Arse’ and shook her hand anyway. He was fond of the f bomb, a trait he wished I didn’t inherit, and there was no one he met who didn’t know who the real Noel Bauer was.
You knew dad was in a room long before you saw him. If you didn’t hear his laugh or his footsteps echo on the floor, you could feel him. I knew where he was the moment he entered my space and if we were in a room together, we were rarely apart. His presence filled a room and as a kid I would do anything I could to make sure I was in it. My dad was the centre of my universe and while I didn’t always do what he wanted me to do, it was his fault I believed I could.
Dad was a fixer. You didn’t ring him with a problem unless you wanted a solution. And if you didn’t want his advice then you shouldn’t have bothered asking in the first place. Dad was a man of opinion and without apology. He bordered on the edge of arrogance but abhorred it in others. He didn’t suffer fools well and suffered time wasters even less. He never made apologies for who he was and didn’t buy into bullshit. But Dad was also a giver. He gave with everything he had and lived with all that he could. He never did a job that didn’t deserve to be done properly. He was a man of his word who lived what he said in all parts of his life.
But my Daddy, more than anything else, loved us. And Dad, right now, if you’re listening, I am so bloody mad at you. There are so many things that you were supposed to do yet. I’m not a grown up yet. I have a nephew coming soon who needs a poppy. I have a future husband somewhere who you are supposed to scare the crap out of. I have stories that need fixing and hugs that need giving and you my daddy were supposed to do them all. I know it’s impossible for you to love us that hard for any longer and for as long as I breathe my future babies and Mitchell’s will know you and I promise that we will love them that hard too.
I know that I can’t be mad at you forever and I know that you’d tell me to keep on moving. And soon, maybe tomorrow, I’ll try and be strong again. I’ll try to remember how glad I am that I had you at all. You loved us more in thirty three years than most people get in a lifetime and I know that I can take the next step without you, but fuck it Dad. I just don’t bloody want to.
life in big frilly knickers 