Rainy days and Sundays....well, that's not quite how the song goes

For as long as I can remember of my married life, I have spent almost every single Sunday with my dad and his wife. Especially once we had kids, we spent every Sunday afternoon and evening. The routine would be: After church, we go out to eat (the more kids I got, the more often we stayed at Dad's house instead). After lunch, we go back to his house. The kids choose the blanket they want for the day from the blanket box. The kids choose a spot on the living room floor. Some sort of sports were chosen for the TV display. Within minutes, Chad is sleeping...and shortly after, most of the other adults are snoozing away as well. After naps, we played games and ate pizza - it had to be Abe's pizza. I'll admit the game playing had kind of gone by the wayside. When football season started, we all adorned our favorite Bears jersey and the card and board games subsided until after the Superbowl. Many times, we'd play Penguin Pat with the boys so we could be the Big Tuna....or My Dog Has Fleas....or Old MacDonald Had A Farm....The kids would go "swimming" in the hottub. Once they were eight months old. That was Dad's magic age. I'm not sure where he got that, but it's the standard that he used. I'd say in the entire time I have been married, there are less than 20 Sundays that we didn't go to Dad's. One weekend we didn't go was graduation because of his senior class sponsor duties on the day of graduation...that weekend was a given. Easter was also a time we usually went to the other side of family. Other than that, Sundays were reserved for time with my Dad.

I think that is why they will always be hard now. I wouldn't trade that time for the world.

I remember playing spoons with my brother and his girlfriend at the time. I was pregnant (either for Luke or for the twins - I'm thinking it was Luke) -- very pregnant. Either Jenny or I got our fourth card, so we quietly reached for the nearest spoon. Realizing one was gone the mad house began. I was sitting across from Dad and Todd. They both needed the only remaining spoon, so they went for it. As a very pregnant person, I ended up on the floor between my chair and both of them....it was rather violent - but all in good fun.

I remember Dad doing the Superbowl Shuffle last year (bad back and all) with Drew and the boys in the living room.

I heard many a referee yelled at from his spot on the loveseat.

I remember after Dad and Jenny got their HUMONGO Christmas tree with like 2 million lights (I'm not exaggerating by much) the first Sunday we went when the tree was all finished for the season. The kids and all of us ooo-ing and aw-ing. Placing our own ornament with our own names on the tree.

These are just a few of the memories that I'm terrified of forgetting.

Today, we met Jenny at Fazoli's after church. It was one of Dad's favorite places to go on Sunday if he had something he had to do in the afternoon or the Bears game started early that week. It was fast....Anyway, we met Jenny. When we walked in, Gabriel looked at her and said, "Where's Pappaw?" Jenny handled it so well...her answer was simply that he was in Heaven. I apologized because I felt the awkwardness. She chalked it up to the way things will be for him for a while. He's too little to truly understand. After all, the man in the casket didn't really even look like who he loves as Pappaw.

I know I have never gone two weeks without talking to my father. I was too close to him for that. If it had been two or three days, it was rare....especially after I graduated from college. But even while I was there, we kept in close contact. Probably more so than many kids.

Today we would have complained that our summers were over because we both would be starting school tomorrow. He would have actually called me Friday afternoon at about 3:00 and said our summer vacation was over because now we were just on a regular weekend like always. I hated being reminded....how I wished for that phone call Friday afternoon!

I think about 33 or 34 years ago today, he married my mom. I'm going to have to call her, but I don't know what to say. I'm sure she is thinking about it. How could you not?

Jenny gave me one of his Bibles....and I still have unopened cards. Sometimes I just get to the point where I can't read another one. I saw someone today that asked me if I had gotten her card. I don't remember reading it and I couldn't make myself tell her that I haven't read them all yet.

In church, we sang some songs that I couldn't think about. I was glad that I had to play and sing behind the piano today...if I would have thought about it too much, I couldn't have done it...but I kind of just went numb. We sang hymns he would have belted with the best of them. We sang a song that reduced me to tears on the stage before anyone but me and Jenny and Chad new he had cancer....I blubbered that day in front of all the congregation to see. The words echoed in my mind. "Every fear suddenly wiped away." How the word "cancer" frightened me! "Here in your presence, all things are new." I kept thinking, "Even his pancreas can be new, God!! Make it so!" That prayer was not answered here on earth. We sang another song that was sung at his funeral...I saw Jenny from over my music singing it with tears streaming down her face in the front row. Numbness...it's all I could muster. I pray God was not disappointed in me this morning...but I just couldn't go there. I just didn't have the strength.

Do you really believe he is with me? Do you really believe in these so-called "signs" people say he will leave me? Is it possible for him to see me from Heaven? Part of me wants to believe it all, but the other part is so afraid, like I've always been, of disappointing him that I hope it's not true. But the thought of him not seeing my kids as they grow up and not being beside me when I need him is completely unbearable. COMPLETELY...