Todd calls nights where you get so rediculously drunk you can hardly speak "Bad Ones". As in I had a bad one last night. I fear tonight I will have a bad one. In fact, I should probably alert the local bars right now not to serve me. I should be a lot stronger...in years past I've avoided the bars, but I'm thinking about heading there right now. I will even go to the bar alone tonight and I'm not even hemming and hawing today about that, if I have to. I'm not proud of what I'm going to do tonight. I'm going to abuse alcohol heavily today/tonight. Abuse it, I shall.

Five years ago today, my dad was killed in a motorcycle accident. He somehow lost control of his bike (there has been no explanation of this) veered across oncoming traffic and hit a tree. His bike burst into flames and he fell straight back without a scratch on him, but he hit his head (wearing a full helmet/visor and all) in just a way that it killed him. It was the day after I graduated from college and it was my parents' anniversary.

My best friend (from home and college) and I were making strawberry margaritas celebrating the end of college. She had just scored a big job at a pharmaceutical company. I, in typical Melina fashion, applied for a job teaching black and white photography and scuba diving in the Florida Keys at some camp for kids a week before graduation. I had done several phone interviews and on graduation day they called to tell me that I got the job. It was a nine month position but they would keep me year round if I would design their brochures for them. I agreed. Tash and I had everything to celebrate, and very little to fear. Our futures were what we hoped for. The phone rang. It was Tash's mom. She sounded strange. I can say this because I had known her my entire life. She told me to put Tash on the phone. I handed the phone to Tash and went over to the stereo and turned down the "graduation song" by Vitamin C. (what can I say, we were just amped about school being over).

Tash got off the phone and said, "I think our parents are throwing us a surprise graduation party or something, my mom said we have to come home." She said this because it wasn't unusual for my dad to do something sneaky like this. One time after Tash and I went to see Candyman (the killer with the hook?) my dad hid under his car and grabbed Tash's ankle with his hook (yeah my dad had a prostetic hook). Tash peed her pants and ran away screaming (I mean actually pissed herself!). I'm not proud of myself but at least I know that I would survive in a horror movie situation. As we were buzzed, we walked over to Tasha's boyfriend's house to see if he could give us a ride. He was nowhere to be found so we hopped into her car and started the two hour drive home. I tried calling my house on my cell phone but I got no answer. I turned to Tash and said, "I think something's wrong with my dad. I think my dad's dead." Tash started to cry. She said, " I don't think it's a party for us. I don't know what's going on." (She honestly had no idea...no one told us because they wanted us to drive home safely).

We got to my house and my entire life changed in an instant. It was like a tableau of a greek tragedy. It was dark but the lights were on in the downstairs. The curtains over the bay window were wide open and there were tons of people surrounding my mom and crying. I knew in that instant exactly what had happened. I got out of the car and began screaming wildly. I don't even know if it was words that came out of my mouth and then the world began swimming around me and I fainted.

I was awful to my mother. I screamed, "I wish it was you!" She tried to hold me and I screamed, "He's fine. You're just a lying bitch! Get your hands off me." I ran away from my house. I walked around the block, holding Tash's hand fiercely. She looked helpless. She looked like she was in the companty of a feral animal. She was. I was frenetic, chaotic energy. I felt my instability and I embraced it. I went with it. Finally, I went home. I cried myself out and now I was just simmering rage. I sat in my father's chair in the den. I curled up and stubbornly refused to go to bed. I told everyone, "I'm going to sit up and wait for my dad to come home." I honestly believed that everyone was wrong. I honestly believed that he was going to come home. I attempted to stay awake. If I closed my eyes then this wasn't just a bad dream. If I closed my eyes, my entire life would change.

I woke up the next morning, empty. My heart hurt. It felt heavy in my chest but my mind had no thoughts and my mouth had no words. I had my very first asthma attack that morning due to panic and stress. I now can hardly go a day without my inhalers. It's not just psychosematic (sp?), I physically lost part of my good health that day. I became evil. I lashed out at everyone. No one could comfort me. I offered my mother no comfort. I shrugged off hugs. I scoffed at people's admissions of grief and condolence. My pain was all that matter and no one "understood" it. I turned down the job in the Keys, I had to stay home and take care of my mom. As much as I wallowed in my pain, grief and the mindfuck that was my life...my mom was doing much, much worse than I was. She was suicidal. She was drinking like a fish. She hardly ever drank and worse--she wasn't supposed to drink because she has a liver disease. We pulled ourselves out of it together. We became like best friends. We're both still a mess, deep down in that hidden place that no one gets to see but she's been dating a guy for a year. Sometimes when we're alone she tells me that she loves him but that it's nowhere near like the way she loved my dad. And I just look at her and say, "How could anyone be loved like Dad was?"

And it's the truth. He was larger than life. I run into people here in the Cornfield and they say, "You're _________'s daughter? Holy shit!" and then they tell me some story about him. Everyone has a story about him. He lives in my stories. I tell them to anyone who will listen.

I miss my dad more and more every day. It has never gotten easier, one of those blanket statements that people make when someone dies is that "Time heals all wounds" and maybe it does for some. For me, I wake up every morning and I'm grateful I'm alive. My next thought is that I'm robbed of another day with my dad. It is always my second thought of the morning, no matter what. My dad was my world. We fought all the time. A couple times it was actually knock down drag out fist fighting. I gave him a black eye (he was proud of me--I didn't say I was without dysfunction). We went months not talking to each other at times because we were both stubborn assholes. We were so much alike that no one would've suspected that we weren't biologically related (although he was the only dad I've known). And then it happened, I forgot (time heals all wounds perhaps?). My mom called me (we talk daily and usually see each other daily. Now that my dad isn't around she's no longer eclipsed) and said, "Are you going to be alright on Saturday?" I inquired, "What's Saturday?" She answered quietly, "May 7th."

I wish she hadn't called. I wish I had continued to forget. It's gorgeous out and this fucking day sucks.

I miss you Daddy so much. This day fucking sucks and I can't decide if I'm glad that no one's around today or if I wish they were.