Two Years Ago Today My Father Died

I wish I felt sadder about it than I do.

I am a philosopher, heart, mind, and soul, so today I am thinking of two philosophers’ ideas. One is Martin Heidegger’s realization that we are thrown into the world. The second is Søren Kierkegaard’s observation that you cannot know what it feels like to lose one’s father until your father dies.

We are thrown into the world. We do not choose when and where we are born or who are parents are. We do not choose who and how they are or how they feel about us or treat us. We do choose how we respond to all of those circumstances, though it may take decades to form a positive response.

We are born knowing only life. If your parents lived long enough for you to know them, you knew only a world that includes them in it. Then one day, one or both of them is not in your world. That changes your world. We then have to choose how we respond to that.

Life is a Beingness, and the most vital of all be verbs. Our individual lives are each a unique combination of the circumstances that affect us and our responses to them, I did not choose my father, though to be fair, he didn’t exactly choose me either. He was not a good father — a fact with which my brother and mother strongly agree. He made poor choices with his life, especially regarding his family.

His choices affected me for many years. All I knew, and all I will ever know, is the father I had. From an early age, my world included him and his…