Has it Been a Year Already?

It doesn't really seem possible that it has been a year since my dad passed away.  Technically, the anniversary is this Sunday, May 19th, but I am fairly certain that he actually died on May 18th, which was a Friday last year.  So, in my head and in my heart, it's been a year ago tomorrow.
For a few weeks leading up to my dad's death, I was constantly bugging Brian about going camping.  I really wanted to be outside for some reason.  I would go out at night to take out the dog and just stare at the lake. The frogs and insects were especially loud, the weather was beautiful.  It was all very peaceful outside and that's where I wanted to be. I haven't been camping since I was a little girl.  Dad used to take us from time to time and I was never really a fan.  But this time last year, that's all I could think about.
The Friday night that my dad died, I took Barkley out, stood and looked at the pond as usual, but I didn't feel right. My stomach was really bothering me.  I had a very uneasy feeling.  I decided to take a bath and see if I could calm down a little bit. But it didn't help. I just had a horrible feeling that something was going to happen to Lucy.  I was extremely worried about her. I know most mothers worry excessively over their children, but this was different. This was a feeling of dread, of overwhelming doom. I just couldn't shake it.
I have had these feelings from time to time in the past.  When I was almost 10, I was sitting in church one day and just had a horrible feeling that my grandpa was going to die. He did a few weeks later and ever since that happened, I've always paid careful attention to that feeling that something isn't right. I often think that, if I talk to someone about it, whatever I'm worried about can't possibly happen, because, after all, I'm not a fortune teller. From time to time, I would get that feeling that something bad was going to happen and I almost always talk to Brian about it. I remember telling him around Christmas Eve that I was nervous about 2012.  I told him that I didn't think it was going to be a good year. He joked that the Aztecs didn't think so either.  But then I told him I felt like someone was going to die that year. I was hoping that, by voicing my concerns, they would not come true. Unfortunately, this time, that was not the case.
For all of my feelings of uneasiness, however, I honestly never saw my dad's death coming. Of course I worried about him, he was getting older and had some serious health problems, but it never occurred to me that we were so short on time.  In fact, I was so obsessed that evening with the idea that something bad was going to happen to Lucy, it never crossed my mind that something terrible was happening to my dad.
My understanding is that he went out fishing that Friday evening, after having returned home from Sienna's graduation.  She never saw him, didn't even know he was there.  He was supposed to go to her house but he didn't, he drove home instead. My brother, Chris, saw him after he returned to Liberal.  He apparently came by the baseball diamond for a bit.  Then, he went home to get ready to go fishing.  As far as I know, no one saw him again until he was found in the pond the next morning by a sheriff's deputy.  My dad could not swim and was always concerned about drowning. I really can't think about how awful this must have been for him. It's too painful to think of how he may have suffered. I just have to hope that the heart attack was quick and that it was all over soon.
The next day, Saturday, May 19th, my mom called.  I was sitting on my bed with Imma watching her play a game when the phone rang.  I almost didn't answer it, but I decided to interrupt Imma's game because my mom doesn't call very often.I will never forget her exact words to me because they completely caught me off-guard. She said, "Levi died yesterday."  I remember every step of the mental process I went through to try to figure out what she had just said.  I remember thinking I had to have misheard her or she must have been talking about someone else named Levi because, surely, if she were talking about my dad, she would have said, "your dad," and she would have done something to prepare me for what she was about to tell me. So, I asked her to repeat herself.  After she said it again, I still had no idea what she was talking about.  My exact thoughts were something to the extent of, "My dad wouldn't die and not tell me about it," which clearly makes no sense, but that's what I was thinking.  I made her repeat it once more time before I asked, "Are you talking about my dad?" By then, my sister, McKinley, was ripping the phone out of my mom's hand and she began to explain the story, or at least what she knew at the time. No one was sure of anything.  I hung up with her and went to find Brian. He was outside. I remember having a horrible time breathing, sobbing, almost unable to talk.  He came in and called Chris.  There were a lot of phone calls made. No one knew where Kelley or Braidi were.  No one knew if they knew. No one knew much of anything.
Even though it's been a year, I still don't feel like I know much more about what happened to my dad that night then I knew that day on the phone.  Since that time, my family has started to crumble.  There's not a lot of glue to hold all us together. I'm doing the best I can but without a patriarch, it's difficult.  My brother, Chris, was outstanding during the whole funeral process and I think this has brought him and I closer together but it's hard to be in the position of oldest male in the family when there are so many of us. I am hopeful that we will all be able to stick together. I know that's what my dad wanted above all else. He talked to me about it often.
He talked about what would happen when he was gone all too frequently for someone who was only 55.  He was very nostalgic those last few years. Now that he is gone, I wish I would have asked more questions. I wish I would have written things down.  I catch myself thinking, "I need to ask Dad about that," all the time but, of course, I can't.
I have learned a lot of life lessons through this experience.  I've learned I'm stronger than I thought I was, I'm older than I thought I was, I'm wiser than I thought I was.  But, at the end of the day, I am, and always will be, a Daddy's Girl.
I often wonder if I was drawn to the pond for those weeks leading up to my dad's death because that's where he was when he passed. He loved fishing and being outside.  Some of my best memories are of him taking me fishing. In the end, he was doing something he loved when he died.  It's just completely unfair that he was so young.
I also wonder why I was so fixated on the idea that something was going to happen to Lucy.  It certainly occurred to me pretty quickly after my dad died that both of their names start with an L. In a way, I feel like he may have made some sort of a sacrifice to keep her safe.  That will sound ridiculous to some people but Lucy talks about PawPaw all the time. Lots of mornings, the first thing she says has to do with my dad. She even points across the room, as if he were there. I'm not saying she's seeing ghosts, but it is nice to think he is looking out for her. He's definitely still an important part of our lives, whether we can see him or not.
This weekend marks the last first--the last time we can say this is the first anything we've done since Dad died. I will be glad to have this year behind me. There have been moments of anger, moments of extreme sadness, moments of despair.  But there have been good moments, too. I have had a lot of support from my friends and family, and people I don't even know.  Those are the things that keep us going and moving forward. Sometimes it is difficult not to dwell on the question of "why?" but our loved ones help us realize it's not the "why?"hat matters--it's the "what now?"
This weekend will not be an easy one. I'm sure there will be moments of tears. There will be moments of celebrating memories of an amazing musician, faithful Christian, sports enthusiast, Civil-War-history-buff-extraordinaire, loving father.  Those are the things we remember most about my dad.  He touched so many lives in so many ways. I can only hope that, when I am gone, half as many people can say I was a positive influence on their lives.  He truly was an extra-ordinary person.