Today was the annual pilgrimage to the Salvation Army kettle, in memory of my father, who has been gone for more than ten years now.

I’ve finally decided that it’s never going to get any easier.

I’ve written about this ritual before, in previous blogs, on this and other platforms, and I wonder every year how I can – or if I should – write any more about it.

The Christmas season is a melancholy one for me because it’s the place where memories cluster of my dad’s worst days; the winter of his life was also the winter of that year, and the light seemed to ebb ever away, eaten up by darkness in every sense.

I’ve told the story of how his cancer came back and he must have known that he was in the end game, yet he resolutely kept a brave face and refused to call Death by its name.

I’ve told the story of how he spent endless days at home, unable to work, and desperately bored and ill, and how I tried to take him on small journeys or errands, just for a change of scenery.

I’ve told the story of how one of those little missions involved going to the bank and withdrawing a substantial amount of money, then him asking if we could go to the mall. Once there, he listened for the sound of jingling bells that led him to the Salvation Army kettle, where he got out his wallet and deposited all of the money he’d taken out of the bank.

I’ve told the story of how my heart broke yet again, watching this happen, and understanding that he absolutely knew that he was going to die, even though he was – we were all – pretending otherwise.

I haven’t told so many other stories though, of that time, because they’re so gut-wrenchingly painful that my mind inevitably, automatically, frantically rushes to protect me, blocking the memories as quickly as they flood back. Shattered fragments of sorrow; destined to draw blood.

I’ll tell these stories though, because as painful as they are, they’re part of the last little while I spent with my dad, and I need to remember as much as I need to forget.

I’ll tell the story, then, of the experimental drug that he took for chemotherapy, a vivid blue fluid that had horrible side effects, that was proposed as a last resort, that he accepted even in the face of knowing that its chance of helping him was virtually nil. Of how I cried inside as I watched the IV bag drain into his veins. Of how withered his hand looked, how transparent and papery; how could the body withstand any more of the attacks of the cancer from within and the chemicals from without? But he wanted us to have a good Christmas together…

I’ll tell the story of going to the exact same mall where the Salvation Army kettle was – before or after he donated; the timeline is a bit of a blur – and trying to shield him as he shuffled through the busy crowds of happy holiday shoppers. Our mission that day was the little bookstore, a special place for us both, as avid readers, since my childhood decades before. We parted ways in the shop, he to the Clive Cussler, Robert Ludlum bestsellers, and me likely to the travel section, and at some point I found him standing beside me, and in a little, quavery voice he said ‘I’ve just shit myself’. I can still hear him saying these words, a simple declarative, with a vain attempt to convey both humour and a scrap of dignity, in the most desperate and the saddest of ways. He sounded so forlorn, like an abandoned child, and all I could think was that I had to protect him, I had to make it right. Back through the oblivious crowds we wove, back out to the car, and I drove him the short distance home. He rolled down the window to let the wintry air in. The smell was terrible, and we just pretended not to notice. When we got back to the house, I got him inside and he retreated into the shower while I laundered his soiled clothes. We both just washed it away and never spoke of it again. I feel like I am betraying him even now, a decade after he’s gone, but damn it, that was the moment when I felt the most intense love ever for my father.

I’ll tell the story of the last Christmas meal we had together, and of the elephant in the room, and the tears that welled in my eyes unremittingly. Of how he and my mother gave us a Christmas gift certificate for plane tickets to Europe, saying that they wanted to thank me for being there for him, and give me something to look forward to in the spring.

After he’s gone.

The words were there. The sentence didn’t need completing.

I could tell other stories, so many, but the tears are already here.

It’s Christmas time once again.