Dating : Reflecting on “Reflecting on the Death of My Father-in-Law”

The story I wrote after he died has over 14,000 views on Medium but…

First, allow me to acknowledge Dwight, my father-in-law, who died exactly two years ago today. We knew his time was short as his health had gone downhill pretty rapidly. Still, a death hits hard and in many ways doesn’t make sense. I still hear his voice. I still imagine I will see him at the next family event.

A few days after he died, I wrote a reflection essay as a tribute and several months later I posted it here on Medium. It’s had a remarkable number of views, well over 14,000, and 4000 reads.

But it has less than 300 claps, and not that I wrote it to get attention or to make money, I’ve earned only $9.28 from it. For all those views and reads, which dwarf every other story I’ve written in the year and a half I’ve been posting on Medium, that seems like a small amount.

So, given all this, I thought I’d re-post the story (see below), along with this new introduction, to see if this story started getting the kind of hits the other one is getting. For you professional Medium writers, if you have any insights you can share with me, I’d sure appreciate them.

Words, Handshakes and Saying Goodbye…

I received many things over the years from my father-in-law, his kindness, sense of humor, respect, love, charm, and joy in his granddaughters among them. I saw these in his eyes and I swear the depth grew deeper as the years passed.

Writing this, I’m finding these things are hard to represent in an article intended to honor my relationship with him and the ongoing depth of his loss in my life.

Besides, I’m pretty sure words don’t exist that would put the feelings in print.

Maybe it’s more a man thing, and maybe the best poets have figured it out. I’m not much of a poet and hiding behind the “man shield” has never been my thing.

Still, for me at least, some things I best experience wordlessly — not necessarily silently, but meditatively. As connected and dependent as we all are, these things simply belong to me alone.

Such was my relationship with Dwight, my father-in-law, who peacefully passed from his body in his sleep last January.

I’ve been thinking about this since saying goodbye to him the night before he died. He was unconscious in what became his deathbed. I had a strong desire to shake his hand before leaving, what had become our tradition while the many women and girls around us shared a bisous (kisses on each cheek).

Michele, his wife, and Melinda (my wife) & Brenda, his daughters, were getting ready to go, and the feeling in the room was this very well could be the last time any of us would see him alive. It was. His three granddaughters had all said goodbye to him the day before.

But Dwight’s hands were under the covers and I didn’t want to disturb him. Besides, I had shaken his hand after the granddaughters departed and he had recognized me in that moment.

Did I need to do it again?

Was I taking time away from his wife and daughters?

I leaned in and said the two words that had been resonating in my mind for days, “Thank you.”

Words are a fascinating thing to experience at times like these. I suppose we all struggle to express ourselves — to the one dying, to ourselves, to the grieving family.

What do we have to say but words?

As you’d expect, right away Michele and the rest of the family began receiving an outpouring of support and warmth from extended family and friends. It was all supremely thoughtful and meaningful, and much of it came in the form of words.

Of the words I had the privilege of reading, the most touching to me came in French from our friends in France, people we call our French family. To best understand them, I put them in Google’s language translator.

I’m not entirely sure what made them so touching, if it was the somewhat awkward nature of the translations, or if it had to do with how messages of condolence are shared in France.

Maybe I’m accustomed to how condolence sounds in native English and these translations gave a fresh spin. Maybe it has to do with how much my connection to France and our French family means to me.

Maybe it doesn’t really matter.

The first French message came from a man named Joël, father to Frédérique and Annabelle, Dwight’s French daughters and his best French friend. Here is how Google translated it:

It is with emotion and sadness to see a friend like Dwight disappear. Annabelle, Frédérique, and I associate ourselves with your pain and this passage to beyond. I ask you to convey to Michele all my support in this event. Dwight and Michele and my wife Monique (in heaven) were great friends of heart … Parents with great values, who have passed on many things to my family whether in the joys and sorrows of life. Life goes on supporting each other, Dwight does not suffer anymore, we will not forget it … I renew all my friendship to Michele and all your family. My sincere condolences.

The second came from a woman named Isabelle and was signed by her father Michel and her sister Brigitte. These are the sisters and father of my good friend, Laurent, who happens to be Frédérique’s husband and who also spent significant time with Dwight over the years:

It was with great sadness that we learned of Dwight’s death. We keep an excellent memory of him and we think very strongly of you and Michèle and all your family. The disappearance, the separation from a loved one, is difficult to accept, to live. You must keep in mind all that he has transmitted to you, his joy of life, his good mood, his sense of relationships …. and learn to communicate differently with him. We offer you our most sincere and heartfelt condolences. We kiss you, all 3.

Indeed, it is my ongoing task to learn to communicate differently with Dwight. I won’t have his actual hand to shake anymore. And while this makes me profoundly sad, doing so successfully is what will keep Dwight present in my life.