Mourning

Today I am mourning the passing of a man I only met once many years ago. He was the husband of a woman I’ve called friend for a long time. I really only knew him though the stories told by my friend, but I know that the world lost a beautiful soul.

He was born a few months after my father, but the two men couldn’t have been more different. Both were products of the times they were born into but the causes they championed and the way they lived and loved were worlds apart.

This comparison makes it seem as if my dad was a bad man. He was not. He was complicated and a victim of his upbringing. which he then inflicted on his wife and children.

The loss of my friend’s husband makes me grieve my dad all over again, both for who he was to me and for the man he could have been.