Eighteen Years Ago.......

Eighteen years ago tomorrow... and it could have been just yesterday. I sat in Dualla National School, a sixth class pupil... had just completed the weekly spelling test that we had every Friday. 20 out of 20. of course I did... that's the score I got every week... but this week was different. The nineteenth of January 1996, exactly a month after my 12th birthday at 12:25 in the middle of the day. My friend's Mother came to the classroom and spoke with the teacher. The whole class was instructed to go outside and I was told to pack up my things as I was going home early. I don't know why I didn't figure out at that point what was going on. My friend's Mother had just gotten a new car and we talked about this on the 5 minute journey home. Even when we got home and there were so many cars there and so many people in the kitchen as we entered the house, people putting their hand on my shoulder as I walked past them.... and I still didn't figure it out.
I went upstairs to my room, took off my coat and was hanging it up in my wardrobe when my Mother and a nurse entered my room and five words were spoken, five words that would change everything, five words that I remember to this day... 'Anne-Marie, Daddy's gone to heaven'. I froze. My Dad had been sick. He had lung cancer and after having one of his lungs removed and receiving the 'all clear', we found out that the cancer had spread to his brain and 'there was nothing more they could do'.

We'd known for 5 months that he was going to die, but somehow it never seemed real... how could it? I remember being 'helpful' for that 5 months. I would meet the hospice nurses when they called every day. I became very close to them, they became members of my family. The would hand me the batteries of the machine that they used, for the life of me I cannot remember what that machine was for, but I remember that my job was to use the battery tester and make sure that the batteries were working. I remember that they gave him this orange coloured liquid to help his bowels to move. He hated this liquid, said it tasted awful. As I look to the table to my right, I realise that orange liquid was probably 'Codalax', the same as I was given after my most recent surgery... and he was right... it does taste awful...!!!
In the last 2 weeks or so before he died, he was very very bad. I remember laying in bed one night and pleading with God to just take him because I couldn't watch him suffer anymore. How can a 12 year old little girl watch her Dad scream in pain and become completely helpless, watch him have to be carried everywhere like a small child because his legs are too weak to support him. This man who fought monsters from my bedroom when I was too scared of the dark, the man who held me on his shoulders so I could see over the crowd, the man who lifted me over fences and gates when we went on adventures through forests and fields, the man who jumped in front of my brother's horse to stop her because she got out of control when I was riding her, the man who suffered countless bruises on his ankles from helping me to improve my camogie skills, the man who carried me to bed and tucked me in when I fell asleep on the couch, the man who was my hero..... and I watch as they wheel his cold dead body into the back room of the funeral parlour... knowing that they will put the lid on his coffin and I will never see my Dad again.

My Dad died at 12:15 that day and I remember promising his still-warm body that he would always be a part of my life and that someday when I have a son, I would name him after my Dad. This became a bit of a joke with my oldest brother who shares the same name as our Dad. About 30 minutes ago, my Dad's youngest sister (My Godmother and beautiful lady that I was named after) posted a lovely poem on Facebook to recognise the 18th Anniversary of his passing and suddenly I realise that I made a promise to my Dad all of those years ago and this is the first time it has struck me... that is a promise I may not be able to keep. 

As I sit here and cry, I am reminded of something my Dad used to say 'You can do anything if you put your mind to it... and if you can't find a way, find a way to make one' 

I inherited a lot of things from my Dad... his blue/green eyes, his dark hair, his messed up sense of humour, his ability to write (my Dad was an amazing writer and poet and we spent many, many hours together just writing and putting stories together, and when we weren't doing that... we were singing and dancing or solving some crossword or puzzle), but probably the most useful things I got from my Dad were his sense of fairness, his problem-solving ability and his downright stubbornness. 

He fought til the very last second, he never gave up... right until he took his last breath, I hope that I can find the strength that he had and can find some way to keep the last promise that I ever made to my Dad.xx.