All is change. Graduation. Cap and gown. Fulfillment. Emptiness. Uncertainty.

He should have been there.

With my qualifications I can work at the Sleepy's Mattress Store or be a mail carrier.

I dreamt I was in a tornado. I dreamt my mother died. I dreamt I kissed Lynette Scavo from Desperate Housewives. I dreamt I got swept up in a strong wind. I dreamt I was an orphan. I dreamt I was in a tornado, again, again, again.

There are always ghosts. Ghosts on the boardwalk, the Brooklyn Bridge, a song, your room. I see you but you disappear.

The grief weighs me down. The more time that passes, the more real his absence becomes. Seven months later, I'm (finally?) facing my father's death. I'm finally feeling the large, gaping hole and the ambiguity of the future. I don't know any longer what I want to do with my life. Law? Journalism? Diplomacy? Teaching? Novel writing? Poetry? I have the passion and the drive, but I've lost momentum. I don't know where to go from here. School? Work? Stay-at-home daughter? Sigh.

The things I most want to do will likely pay horribly. I'm not obsessed with dollar signs or anything, but I want to live comfortably and work reasonable hours. I've spent hours- days- browsing jobs and opportunities and I've yet to figure out what career will be both personally and financially rewarding. I always knew what I wanted and went for it, but that was easier to do when I was in school and could avoid thinking of practicality.

I'd love to be a Foreign Service Officer, but that means leaving family for years to serve abroad. Can I leave my mom - my everything - for that length of time? And when I get married, can I ask my husband to put his own career goals on hold so he can come with me? I no longer know what I am made of, nor am I certain what I am willing to sacrifice to get ahead.

Can I settle for a normal but happy life or will I be unsatisfied with anything but adventure? But then, what EXACTLY is adventure? I'm SURE there is something in this world that I can love doing, but what?

The grief weighs me down. Grief for Daddy, but also for college. Things were so much simpler when I had a full scholarship, a free dorm, and time to figure out what I was doing. But time wasn't time at all, and it passed so quickly.

For almost half of college, I faced life with a dying father, and it was the most important half, the half where I was meant to decide some big things about life. I was supposed to be interning at newspapers and non-profits when I was home watching movies with my dad or at the hospital holding his hand. It feels as though I've lost everything. So many great opportunities are only open to undergraduates. "Entry-level" jobs still demand experience, but how can I get said experience without having done a single internship? I've had more life experience in two years than many people have had in twenty, but can I put that on a resume? Will my devotion to my family get me hired?

The truth is, I'm afraid. I thought I was qualified for more than fetching coffee or flipping burgers. It was bad enough that I lost my father, but why does it feel like I've lost direction, drive, and appetite for greatness?

I want to do something great, but I need to do it for the right reasons. I won't become great if I only do it to to prove myself. I need to regain the passion I had once. I need to have dreams again.

I feel like I am floating. My fingers and eyes explore the world's possibilities on a computer screen, but then the computer crashes, and the world closes in on me.

I may seem pessimistic, but that isn't it. I'm simply lost.

The death changed me, I suppose. I find it more difficult to connect with people, these days. I feel distant from even my closest friends. I miss them but I don't know what to say to them anymore. When I'm with them, I feel disconnected from their world, their jokes, all that I missed when I was with my family.

But, I WILL find my way, though I won't do it alone. The first step is realizing that I am imperfect, and need a little help every once in a while.

all i can say is that this semester is FUCKING MISERABLE. i pulled an all-nighter just so i could go out on my birthday, then i worked all day saturday and pulled another all-nighter saturday night. i didn't finish the immediate work i had to do until well into the afternoon on sunday. to make matters worse, i have school all day today, and a paper due thursday as well as a spanish exam. so basically, i have to work all fucking day tomorrow. And I'm sick...AGAIN! I've been getting sick so much lately, probably because I don't have time to sleep :( this is awful. all i wanted was for my second semester of senior year to be calm and relaxing after everything i went through last year, and it's just the worst thing in the world. we're only 3 weeks into the semester! this is supposed to be the easy time! i'm afraid it's only going to get worse...

you always won at board games
and you always won at cards

your luck was better in monopoly
than it was in life

you died young
but still your racecar races
down the board

and your battleship,
it battles on.

--

today it makes 4 months. i can't believe it's been so long. every day it feels like i lose a little more of you. i lost you all at once, but i suppose i just couldn't take it in the moment. so i lose you little by little, like i'm slowly sipping tea until the cup is empty.

---

i cannot lose you all at once
so i slowly sip my tea
and lose you one sip at a time.

the cup is nearly empty;
it's been four months since you've gone.
and still,
my quaking hand is holding on.

the moment's come and left,
but it comes and comes again
as i drag it out with every sip,
i do not gulp.

the tea is nearly gone,
but i'm afraid that i'll forget the taste
if i drink it down too fast.

as it is,
my tea's gone cold,
and i'm forgetting.

flabbergasted.

fuck you, dan. can't believe all i was to you was a piece of fricken meat!

new year is the only holiday i really associate with you, with our family unit being together as opposed to getting presents or eating. it is the holiday we play a family game, all of us, the one time a year this happens, especially recently. it was weird watching dick clark counting down to 2011 without you here. i cant stand that theres just three of us now. i miss you like crazy. its 2011. i want to say good riddance to 2010, but i dont think i can, because at least you were with us for most of it. as bad as it was, you were here.

i think i almost cried at midnight. i think my mom did too. but we both held it in because we were playing monopoly, and trying to at least pretend things were normal. they weren't. they'll never be. not that normal. maybe some new-fangled version of normal, but never again will anything be the same.

got my a+ in spanish. you should have been here.

i love you.

i've been thinking of you tons as i get my grades back. i have one more left to get, but even this semester, i've managed to pull off a 4.0 so far, though i technically haven't gotten all of my grades. A in middle eastern history. A+ in essay writing. still waiting on spanish...but even without my spanish grade, i know you'd be proud. i constantly wish you were here so i could share my successes with you, little as they may be. i've told so many people how well i've done in school, in spite of the insanity this semester and the odds against me, and no one seems quite as excited as i am. i know you would be though. i just wish you were here to be proud. i wish you were here to give me advice on what the hell to do with my life after college, even if it means nagging me about how i should go to law school instead of gallivanting around the world aimlessly to places you probably think are too dangerous. i wish you were here to send me emails about the countries you don't want me to go to. i wish you were here to warn me about the rate of infectious diseases in ghana. i just wish you were here period. and god, it hurts so much.

i think of you when that Coolio song, "Ill See U when You Get Here," comes on, the one that you noticed in Atlantic City because it uses classical music.

the bottom line is, i miss you every second of every day. i am constantly reminded of you. everything is strange and foreign without you. nothing feels right and nothing feels the same. i can't get over how unfair this is. i'm doing better than i was, really trying to have a positive attitude, enjoy life, and appreciate what i have, but the moments i miss you sort of build up. in and of themselves, they're bearable, but after a while, my heart grows heavy with longing. i wish i'd had a more definitive conversation with you towards the end establishing that you were alright. my memories of you towards the end are of you not trusting us, telling us not to let anyone take you away, not to take away the house from you, not to kill you, etc. i know that that wasn't you, that it was the toxins in your brain making you paranoid, but i still can't shake these memories. i'm having trouble with them. i'm having trouble with the fact that you weren't ready to go and that you were so afraid of the end. i think of that morning when i woke up to see you stroking my mom, and i feel that perhaps that was the moment you started to come to terms with things. but by then you could barely speak. i just wish we had talked. i wish you had been able to tell us what you were feeling. i wish i had been braver and better and more attentive. most of all, i just wish you were here, still...and well. i wish this whole year hadn't happened. i wish that my typing all of these wishes out would actually make them come true. i wish that there is life after death, and that you know about my grades and you ARE proud of me still, even if you can't tell me so. just please, please let me see you again someday. i've never been patient, but i can manage to wait if i know we'll reunite. i want things to be OK, but how can they be when i miss you so much and when i want so badly to know if you are more than ashes scattered at sea?

just wondering, how is it already the middle of december?

it kind of scares me how time is passing...it will be two months in two days...