Saying Goodbye to my Dad | It's complicated

This is the eulogy I wrote and read at the funeral service for my Dad on January 21, 2023.

Thank you for coming to commemorate the passing, and celebrate the life, of my father.

I wasn’t going to speak. I didn’t want to do the traditional eulogy, as I felt I really was able to cover how proud I was of him and his accomplishments at his retirement party only a few short months ago. I was going to introduce the lovely people you will hear from next, and be at peace that he had heard me when he was still here. 

But, as I went through the process of coming to terms with the loss of him, a journey I feel will be going on for quite a while, perhaps forever, I realized that maybe this is part of that process for ME. Being up here and telling you about my relationship with my father. 

For, you see, it was complicated. 

And perhaps all father-daughter, parent-child relationships are. 

And as I saw all the amazing tributes come in about how wonderful he was, and he was! I really had to come to terms with the feelings it evoked. 

And I finally thought, perhaps it wasn’t that I knew he was amazing. Because I did. Perhaps it was complicated because I had to learn that he was also human. 

As his oldest child, and the first girl, there was a period of time when we were pretty enamored with each other I think. I was pretty sure I wanted to be just like him when I grew up. I wanted to make him proud. As proud of me, as I was of him. 

But, now, as a parent myself, I’ve learned that as part of this kind of relationship, it’s the only relationship in which eventually, naturally, the other person - our children - must fly away. 

Must set up their own households, their own way of being in this world. Standing on their own, very capable, feet. Trusting that we as parents did all that we could. 

Except, who would want to fly away from my dad? 

And that recent understanding gave me some peace with my complicated feelings that I have the rest of my life to untangle. To sit with. To accept. 

And I will tell you that perhaps the biggest lesson he could have given me is that he WAS human. 

And he knew it, and he always tried to do better when he knew better. 

And he was always learning. 

And I saw him change. 

So that is the lesson I have and will continue to try to embody, as I proceed on my perpetual journey away from the nest. Away from my father. 

And I know now, that no distance, even this - the greatest distance, can replace him in my heart, or could have replaced me in his, something I was so afraid of when I was little, and probably far longer into adulthood than I would care to admit.  

And continue to be grateful for the difference he made in all the lives of the people here today, and countless more who couldn’t be here in person, but are here in spirit. 

So thank you, for being here, and for being a part of his journey, in whatever way. And thank you for holding us up, his family, and each other, as we all say goodbye.