Wednesday, March 18, 2009

My Life - the movie

It's a movie with Michael Keaton and Nicole Kidman. It's about a man who is diagnosed with terminal kidney cancer, and how he learns to enjoy life basically by dying. That's it in a nutshell.

However it is one of the most moving movies to me. Perhaps it's because my Dad died of kidney cancer, but I cry through this ENTIRE movie. EVERY TIME I watch it, and I have watched it many many times. I find it really cathartic, if for some reason life is pushing me harder than I can take, and I know I NEED to cry, but can't, I watch "My Life". Then I cry and cry and cry. And I miss and remember my Dad, who was NOTHING like the character in the movie. It's 15 years this year since he Died, and at times the wound is as raw as it was on day one.

My Dad was a neat guy. He was the kind of person you couldn't dislike, well as long as you weren't RELATED to him :). I cannot recall him ever disliking anyone either, as long as you weren't RELATED to him (I was VERY good at pushing his buttons).

He taught me how to laugh at everything, including myself. Because if you can't laugh, life just blows chunks.

He taught me to love nature and everything in it, and how to respect it. He was a hunter, ducks mostly, I still hate duck. He taught me how to identify different types of birds while they are in the air. I can still do that - which amazes my kids :) I learned to cook in a duck blind in the dark, and the cold. I can still make a mean duck blind breakfast because of him.

He taught me to cook, to have a passion for food. How when you put the time and effort into it, there is untold joy in watching people eat what you've made.

He was the luckiest sob I EVER met. One time he won 900 in the roll of a day in his favorite bar, then took 20 dollars stuck it into a video lottery machine and won TWO THOUSAND dollars there, THEN took 20 dollars of THAT and won ANOTHER TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS. I wouldn't have believed it had I not watched it happen. I asked him how much he was going to tell my mother he won. The reply was "You'd blackmail you're own FATHER?" I gave him my best sad puppy eyes and said "Blackmail is such an ugly word, I prefer extortion. And yes, yes I would." He paid my rent that month and bought me a boatload of groceries. Not to mention we both drank a few beers at the bar. I still laugh about it.

He was also morbidly obese. REALLY morbidly obese. We had him cremated right away because we didn't want people to look at how big the coffin would be and say "LOOK how big he was!" I couldn't demean him like that.

It kills me my children will never meet him. I see him in each one of them. Lilly has his heart and inability to think bad of ANYONE, and his salesmanship abilities. Lil could sell you and ice cube in January during a blizzard. Vincent has his love of hunting, if my father were alive Vincent would have his own ARSENAL by now. Lol. Isabella has his charm, when she turns it on it's IMPOSSIBLE to not like her.

I really don't know what brought this all up today, but I miss him. More than I could ever express.

Love you Dad!

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