Art of Depression

Dear dad. I wish I was writing this to send to you instead of just as a note in my phone that I pretend you can read from wherever you are on the other side.

I miss you, but I’m so angry. At you, at Lara, at Sarah, at EJ (who I can’t even call grandma), at everyone who was directly impacting your life and just stood by and did nothing while you ended it. How could they not have known? Who was the final straw? What were the thoughts going through your mind when you pulled that trigger? Why didn’t you leave us a note? Why did you have to go?

I wanted nothing to do with you for so many years. I hated you for not being in my life and I was naive as fuck for thinking it was all on you and never realizing that it was a combination of all the people around me that made you not able to be there. I tried to reach out but you were already too far gone. I’m sorry I didn’t try sooner. I’m sorry I didn’t do more.

I got so many of your traits and characteristics, most of them I didn’t even know about until you were gone and that makes them so much harder to live with every day.

I got your goofy giant smile.
I got your height.
I got your bad sense of humor.
I got your blonde hair.
I got your blue eyes.
I got your knack for working on cars.
I got your ability to learn anything fast as fuck as long as I can practice it just a couple times.
I got your short temper.
I got your favorite color.
I got your musical ability to play by ear, and also your lack of patience to learn to play an instrument.
I got your tender heart.
I got parts of you that were never recovered after your time in the Army, parts of you that you could never get back no matter how hard you tried to work on it.

I got too much and not enough.
I wish you were still here.