One day just 365 apart was the lowest of lows and highest of highs for me. That day is July 30th.
Like so many as a kid, I looked at my dad as my hero. The man I looked up to and wanted to be like. Never in my mind did I imagine a day where he wouldn’t be there.
And then just like that July 30th, 2020, I woke up and my father was no longer there. In the early morning hours of that day, he had a heart attack while in bed watching tv.
Being the person that found him, was rough. Honestly, it’s hard to get that moment out of my head. Every thing that happened that day is in my head. The 911 call, calling Karina crying, my neighbor sitting with me as I waited for the cops to arrive, Karina’s cousin sitting with me to make sure I’d eat something. I recall every minute of that day.
And exactly one year later I recall every moment of that day too. It was the day Karina and I found ourselves at the Clark Country Courthouse in Las Vegas getting married.
Nobody has ever asked why, but I feel like it is a question they probably want to ask.
Why the 30th of all days?
The answer is pretty simple and it has to do with the week before my dad’s passing.
Six days prior to his passing my dad was released from the hospital following a major heart attack that landed in the hospital for weeks. One day within those 6 days I returned home from work and found my dad on the back patio playing a game on his phone. I sat with him, and the conversation of life came up. Those weeks in the hospital I could tell scared him. He mentioned there were only two things in life he wanted before it was all over. 1. To see Karina and I get married 2. Was to be a grandfather. I didn’t think a ton of that talk at the time. Though days later I did as I wondered if my dad knew his time left was limited.
Some 11 months later, when Karina decided to tie the knot. I suggested a day… July 30th. Let’s celebrate his life and wish by doing it then.
Just post kidney transplant we were in no shape to fly, but we did. We flew to Vegas, where I grew up went into the courthouse, and then in a small rain shower walked to a chapel on Freemont Street. Karina, I, and her roommate David as he was our witness.
“Is this really happening?” I think that was the thought we all had. Karina because her parents weren’t there. Me because I wasn’t sure I’d make it to that day after the struggles I had over the past year. And that moment for David was when they handed him actual legal paperwork to sign.
July 30th is a significant day in my head now. Because it’s the day one journey ended and a year later a new journey began.
I think some people might think it was a weird thing for us to do it of all days then, and maybe it was. Though, if I had the opportunity to do it all over again, I wouldn’t change a thing.
I know we did it the right way by him. He wouldn’t have wanted us to be sad. So today I raise a glass to him and to my wife. May July 30th always be what it will be… The lowest of lows, followed by the highest of highs.
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