My father died on Octobe 23, 2010. It’s been eleven years. Head shake. It doesn’t seem that long, except when it seems much longer.

I’m reprinting a post written a couple of days after his death. It reminds me what living through his death felt like.

First posted October 26, 2010.

My sister and I returned to my father’s nursing home later in the day of his death. Their staff had already taken down the photos of each of our cats that had been on the bulletin board, and put magazines and books, stacked up over the past two years, into a box on the floor under the window. We stuffed most of his clothes into clean garbage bags, and decided to donate them to the facility, where they will be reused by other men. His shoes, some with lots more wear in them, would go to Goodwill.

We carried out a small chest of drawers Bonnie had put together for him, and his walker, two photographs taken on May Day 2009, and just a few odds and ends. The rest stayed behind as we walked, for the last time, back down the hall to the nursing station, past the common room that his mind often transformed into the 1940’s Commercial Club on Bethel Street, and to the elevator, down to the small lobby, and into the cramped parking lot.

There just wasn’t much left.

A friend from Austin, Texas left a response to my comment about my dad not returning in my dreams. She wrote:

My father and I have a deal: when he crosses over, if it’s at all possible, he’ll get back in touch to tell me what’s up. That said, I’ve had subtle signs from those that have passed that all is well.

You’ve had a long good bye with your dad, so watch for those subtle signs – it could be documents you stumble across that make a mental connection, a ringing phone, a person who comes into your life with a message, or even an emotion/vision that comes over you that you know is from him – you never know. It’s mysterious and wonderful, this continuum of life.

Subtle signs?

I got up at just about my normal time Monday morning, 4:45 a.m.

I made my way to the dining table, trying my best not to trip over the cats that were lobbying hard for breakfast.

I turned on an overhead light, then dimmed it down.

My laptop was waiting, and I still had to complete the little photo gallery of the weekend’s dogs. There was a stack of several portable hard drives next to the computer because I spent some time Sunday afternoon looking for “the” photo to accompany my dad’s obituary.

I grabbed the top one, which I thought had the latest photos.

As I lifted it, I turned it over to read my handwritten label. It was upside down, but I read: “Photos John Lind”. That was a surprise, both because I thought the latest drive had been on the top of the stack, and because I didn’t recall labeling a “John Lind” drive. But, I thought, let’s see what’s on it.

So I plugged it in, booted into Lightroom, my image library software. It immediately opened to the dogs playing on the beach, which meant that it was the latest drive after all.

Now I picked it up again, turned it over. This time the label was quite clear: “Photos June 2010.” That’s how I marked it, with the first month it sent into service.

Perhaps my eyes, stress, and the early hour, had simply played tricks the first time around. Just a silly little thing, perhaps.

But I thought of that comment about little signs.

Who knows?

And, finally, I expect to be offline tomorrow, and perhaps through Monday. I’m going through the 24,000 or so photos I’ve taken so far this year, and trying to select candidates to use in my three annual holiday gift calendars, featuring Kahala at dawn, our Kahala cats, and Kahala morning dogs. It’s the time of the year when “oh, I’ll work on it next month” turns into “OMG, it’s got to get done NOW!”