Another year without him

It's Veteran's Day again, and I'm restraining tears as I sit at my desk.  It has been just over a year and a half since my favorite veteran passed away.  Last year, I wrote this tribute.  In 2008, I likely celebrated Veteran's Day with the following conversation.

Grandma: Hello?

Me: Hi Nana, it's me.  Is Papa there?

Grandma: Oh yes, let me get him.  (Yelling...)  Reid, pick up the phone, it's Megan.

Papa: Helllllloooooo-oh!

Me: Hi Papa.  Hey guys, guess where I am right now?

Nana: Oh, where, honey?

Me: I'm at the Pentagon.  I was just thinking of you and wanted to call to wish my favorite veteran a Happy Veteran's Day.

Papa: Well, I'll say...

That's not quite an accurate account.  By the time my commute between school and home required me to wait for the bus at the Pentagon, Papa was rarely at home.  He lived in a nursing home most of the time those last few months and I could hardly ever reach him.  But we had several chats while I waited for the 10 E at the Pentagon, and I always asked him to guess where I was.  They were so proud of me being in Washington D.C. and going to law school. 

Today is probably the sort of day when I would try to go for a run from my apartment to the Memorial Bridge only to find out that the trail along VA-27 was closed to foot traffic.  I would resign myself to jogging up to the Air Force Memorial and taking in the view of our nation's Capitol.  After class I would probably find myself wandering the three miles between school and Arlington National Cemetery to read the same quote I would have read earlier at the Air Force Memorial: "just as fire tempers iron into fine steel, so does adversity temper one's character into firmness, tolerance, and determination." (Senator Margaret Chase Smith, Lt. Colonel, United States Air Force Reserve)  I would have searched for a tissue while making my way to the Blue Line.

But I don't live in Virginia anymore.  So instead, I'm sitting on the 37th Floor in a sea of skyscrapers with pictures flooding my memory.  Pictures of Papa standing in his driveway waving to us, his hand in a flapping motion and blowing us kisses until our car turned the corner; pictures of Papa reading the Christmas story to all of his grandchildren out of the Bible; pictures of him with IVs and a breathing tube; pictures of him from a dream I had just a few weeks ago, dancing at a wedding.  Oh how I had hoped he would live to be at mine.  Memories overwhelm my self-restraint; I am reaching for a tissue.