Nine Years

My father died nine years ago today.

Back in the Bay Area, I'd mark the day by walking the Lafayette Reservoir, where he took his daily constitutional. It made me feel closer to him. Here in Rome, I wasn't sure how to find that.

We were only here together once — 1990, the usual tourist circuit. A different lifetime.

I don't know where nine years went. Some of it was Covid, which existed in its own dimension of time. But there's not a day I don't think of him. I am still my father's daughter — the good parts (generous, curious, ethical, smart, funny) and the harder ones (anxious, wanting control over things I can't control).

I guess I don't need to be there to have him here.

He's always here.