Dear Jacob,

I have been especially weepy and sad lately. There is a sadness that is with me that dampens my life like a misty morning walk. I think about the family allot, especially you son; mostly of you Jacob. I want to be happy, I laugh and smile on my journey but I have constant sadness in my heart. The smiles are not forced they are real, yet the kind of happiness I once knew died with you and the others. I suppose I cannot recover that kind of happiness ever again. I wish I could regain a cheerful song in my soul again. Someday perhaps, or perhaps never in this lifetime.

I am on a foggy road and sometimes I cannot tell whether it is good or bad. Music drones everywhere and has been a particular torment to me. My heart will not permit me to be completely happy and the blues give me the blues. I want to escape every happy melody and run from the sad dirges of lost love. I have hung my harp on the willows and I never care to hear a tune; I have rarely picked up my harmonica to play since you died. There is much sorrow in song and all the laughter seems senseless to me; it is all painful noise to me now. I sit in the pew and I do not sing, I listen and I weep. I wonder if you sing to God, I wonder what you sing to God with that beautiful voice he blessed you with.

I walk with your mom on a fractured path. Nothing is the same and it can never be the same, it seems like a dream but this dream is now our life. All the family gladness has a tone of sadness of what was and can never be again. Family laughter is a faint and fading echo in our empty house. We are here, we are in your childhood home but there are no birthday celebrations, no dinner table talks, no Christmas morning family time no late night baseball games. There is silence and the silent house makes me sad. Yet there is a comfort here because this is where you lived, loved and left us behind.

What you wanted most for your sister has happened. She is married and she is truly happy and yet they are forever sad at the same time. I hear your brothers laugh and it make me happy, it does my heart good to hear it, yet it hurts because he no longer has a brother in his life. I have 3 brothers and now he is left alone; this saddens me too. You were always so proud of them both, you were a wonderful brother to them.

I hurt, I wish the pain away yet I know it’s here to stay. It builds and builds until a day like today when the tears flow and sadness finds its release. Grief is without containment, it finds a way of release whether in good or bad ways. I wish I could say that only good has come of it for myself, but to believe that would be to believe a lie. I am different, I am better and I am worse in so many ways. I pray to be shaped in a good way and that the work of God would not be resisted by me. Yet I am just a man, prone to failure and weak in my flesh. God help me.

Your mom; what can I say about your mom? Your mom has few words for her hurt, she is afraid to cry because the crying may never stop. Grandma came to see you six weeks after you left us. Life got twice as hard and she is carrying allot of sadness as well. She is strong and we are stronger together than when you left us. I see her words in her eyes, they tell me things that only I can understand. Her faith has given me strength and I thank God for giving me a wife that helps me in my many weaknesses.

Your remembered by us every day. I recently walked and thought of you on a stoney Alaskan beach and I cried with each step. I saw beauty and desired that your eyes could have seen the things I saw, yet my eyes have yet to see the beauty that you now behold. I wanted to hear your voice, see that crooked smile and enjoy that gargled laugh of yours. I walked alone and I walked sad as I missed your presence on that far away beach, your in my heart every day. Your never forgotten, your life mattered to all you touched- you made an impact and people are different because of you. Your life has changed me for the good.

Some memorial tattoos have been inked on some special people. Shawn, YoYo, mom, Ed have all done something special to honor your life. Jared and I have ours coming; yeah Jake I want to get a tattoo. They do mean something, mine is on the front cover of my bible on a sticky note. Do you remember what you wrote? “Smile dad, your son loves you- Jake” I am smiling son, I’m just sad with a smile on my face.

Wishing I could hold you…until then I will have smiles of sadness

I love you- dad