Mac Cheesie

Every year, for seven years, I've made my dad's mac and cheese for thanksgiving. Pretty sure I haven't skipped a year. Maybe the last year I was home, actually. He had already been diagnosed I think, and we were cleaning up his diet, and ours, hardcore.

He started the email that he sent the recipe to me with that ^
Been calling me tigerlily since I can remember.

This has turned into a "remember my dad" blog, but it feels like the only place to let these things out. When you talk to people they make sympathy face at you. I don't know if there's a reaction I could even deem ideal. I don't think I want to really talk about it. I just want to put this feeling, this memory somewhere for someone to see it. Probably no one. But I can come back here and see it myself, no matter where I am. "Okay tigerlily let's fly."  Okay dad.

I had to go through all of emails to me to find the recipe. Gmail never wants to bring it up when I search for it, even though I know- it's mac cheesie, not mac cheesy. I had to go through all of his emails to me - SEVEN YEARS of emails- and, no, I didn't have to click on them all, but some I couldn't help. God, I should have talked to him more. I should have! I knew he was dying, even if they insisted he wasn't, I knew he was. The tension in my neck and shoulders is back. I can feel it rise when I think about him. These memories are hurting me.

Dad and me in Paris

I had a party last night -

-and at some point I made my roommates coworkers come into my room and feel my pillows to see if they could tell the feather down one from the not feathers one when they both had bed bug covers on them. Then I had them look through all my books and talk with me about them.

Life of the party.
Part of the lifey.