One year later

A year both slow and fast.

This week held four first anniversaries for me. Because we realized on a Tuesday that my dad had disappeared but we didn’t find him until that Friday after days of searching, the shape of the week is burned into my brain. We also have the calendrical anniversaries, where he went missing on the 13th and we found his body on the 16th (today).

It’s been an easier week than I anticipated. A thin layer of sadness spread over everything, yes, but I expected copious bouts of sobbing and generally not being able to function. Those expectations were almost certainly skewed; a full emotional repeat of the actual week wasn’t ever going to happen. Part of me also suspects that I’ve finished processing and have digested the tragedy into backstory, but I don’t have a good read on whether that’s accurate. What I do know, though, is that reading has been harder this past week; I barely eked out ten pages on Wednesday.

A few months ago I worked with someone on a collaborative art-related project that was due to be released next month. He had expressed interest in attending my art shows, so I emailed him near the end of last month to let him know about my I Lexi show at Writ & Vision. I realized this past Wednesday that I never heard back from him. He’d used his work email (the project was through his employer), so I wondered if perhaps he’d been laid off. I googled him…and immediately ran into his obituary. He’d been dead five days when I emailed him. Further digging revealed that he took his life. Oof. Sad and awful. That discovery cast an extra death-haunted tint on the day.

Last week I learned that my dad killed himself during National Suicide Prevention Week. I’m sure it had nothing to do with my dad’s choice of timing, but the irony is not lost on me.

As we gathered at my dad’s gravesite this week, I realized the typeface I used on the headstone (Literata) is the same typeface I use on my site. (Till the next redesign, anyway.) I don’t think I was conscious of that when I designed the stone; I was more concerned about choosing a typeface that was readable and had thick enough strokes for the engraving.

Here we are one year later and I’m still not done with the administrative side of the estate. Should get there in the next week or so, though. Crazy how long it takes.

Last but not least, thank you to all of you who’ve reached out this week to let us know you’re thinking of us. It’s meant a lot to us.