Always In My Heart

My Dad was born in London, and at the age of 16, wanted to join the Royal Air Force; his attempt was thwarted by his parents. However, in 1943 at the age of 18 he eventually signed up.

Stationed just outside Burn, Yorkshire, during WW2 , Dad completed 34 sorties as a Tail Gunner aboard a Halifax Bomber. For his courage and devotion to duty, he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross in 1945.

I could write volumes on my Dad’s military career; and life after his decision, in 1954, to leave the RAF in order to provide a more stable life for his family, but I will share the condensed version.

My Dad has always been my hero, a strict but loving father, a devoted husband, a perfectionist, an honest and hardworking man. I couldn’t begin to list the life lessons he taught me from a very young age and I will always remember the original bedtime stories he would make up. Even as a grown woman, I was always his ‘little girl’.

We now move many years ahead from when our family came to the United States in 1958. Dad had been diagnosed with Emphysema in 1990 and within a couple of years his health had really declined. In 1993, as I have written in a previous post, with both parents needing care, we were in the process of having them move in with us. Then, unexpectedly, at the end of September, my Mom passed away. Our family was devastated, my father crumbled.

After several weeks of hospital care and respiratory rehabilitation, he was ready to rejoin us. We were so happy and I readied our spare room for his homecoming. Equipping the room required quite a bit of modification but I was so looking forward to having Dad come home.

It was 2 a.m., the morning of Dad’s discharge, when the phone rang, my heart formed a lump in my throat as I reached for the receiver, I could barely speak. Sometimes you just know things, I can’t explain it, but you just know.

On November 5, 1993, at the age of 68, my hero, my Dad was gone. I know my Dad had several medical issues but I truly believe that he died of a broken heart, just six weeks after my Mom.

I doubt that I will ever get over losing both parents in such a short span of time, even after the years that have passed, there is an emptiness that never goes away.

In his memory, I would like to share one of my Dad’s favorite poems, it’s called ‘High Flight’.

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of—wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air....
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark nor even eagle flew—
And, while with silent lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
~John Gillespie Magee, Jr.