we all go alone, in the end

Though you are gone
I am still your son
And though your pain is over
Mine has just begun
-Assemblage 23, "Disappoint"

The first time I let myself cry out loud was in the car coming home from the music store a few days ago. Barely eleven in the morning but hot already and I'd stuck this Assemblage 23 album in the stereo. It's one Tom Shear wrote after his own father's death. I wept and thought about how many times I would have to show up somewhere with a death certificate in the next few months.

I've struggled with what to write and what to say, in person and in the wired. It was no secret that my relationship with my father was difficult. We didn't speak in the past year. I got tired of being the one to always call, to try to initiate some contact that I could never tell if it was welcome. My father came to my home once, but found excuses to avoid other engagements. He would never call, and he was so resentful that I didn't call. It was a tangle complicated by everything else in our lives.

My father is dead. I imagined there would come a day when that sentence was true for me, but as much as you try to ready yourself it will never be enough. No one ever talks about how much you have to do afterwards, when you are least able to make decisions. I have never felt this tired, this ground down inside and outside. I'm dismantling what remains of my father's life, day by day.

I scream in the car, on the freeway where we all move so fast. Standing still and moving at the same time, with the music turned up loud. There are so many things unsaid, so many questions unanswered and we will all have to live with the choices we made.

Partial soundtrack:
Florence and the Machine - "Breath of Life"
Area 11 - "Heaven Piercing Giga Drill (Piano version)"
Assemblage 23 - "Disappoint"
Suicide Commando - "Death Cures All Pain"