Happy Birthday Papa

Let's begin with a chat I was just having this afternoon with Millie. Only hours after I spent some quiet time at the Church of the Gesu. :)

Kagey: well... its my dad's bday today and so i went by the chapel at my old uli to say a small prayer and right after singing happy bday to him, i found myself totally losing it. just crying and crying. so i feel a bit weird today as well.
Millie: aww. sorry kage
Kagey: its okay. its like i just never really got used to the idea that he's really dead. and i wish sometimes that i could know for sure that he's watching us. not in a creepy restless ghost way...
Millie: yeah,sometimes that reassurance would be good.
Kagey: just cos like so many awesome things have happened for me since he passed... and i kind of wish i knew for sure that he knows about those things. like getting on wetsand's homepage. and my promotion at work. or even that i got my cordao in capoeira.
Millie: i think maybe if you believe he's there,then he'll be there.

And that leads us to this... my 2008 sort of birthday gift for Papa. I'd like to think this is what he was telling me today.

I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun,
I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags.
I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love,
If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.
You will hardly know who I am or what I mean,
But I shall be good health to you nevertheless,
And filter and fibre your blood.
Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,
Missing me one place search another,
I stop somewhere waiting for you.

~ Walt Whitman
Song of Myself (Leaves of Grass)

For those nights at the ULTRA sitting right behind the Purefoods bench, screaming ourselves hoarse (even on school nights). For picnics at midnight in your room with Mama and Ton. For coming to all my figure skating practices and driving me home afterwards. For teaching me "it's not what you know, it's what grade you get." Hahaha. For letting me stay home to watch the Chicago Bulls' Threepeat finals. For giving me my first camera (Mama too). For yelling when you should have (I could be a snot sometimes, I know) and for hugging when I needed it. For impersonating Goofy's voice. For playing practical jokes on my friends. For correcting my grammar and editing all my papers, even my book reports. For introducing me to the wonderful world of the Food Network. For 27 years of being the best dad ever, there will never be enough space for all the things I want to thank you for.