Member-only story
How Often Do You Tell Your Parents “I Love You”?
There will come a day when you can’t
It was a cold early morning in March when my dad dropped me off at the bus station on his way to work.
It was the last time I would see him alive.
The year was 1992. I was taking a semester off from George Mason University and working full-time at a credit union at the Pentagon. I was engaged. I was also not doing well at school. I needed that semester to figure some things out.
A couple of things I had figured out…
- I didn’t want to work as a credit union teller for the rest of my life
- I didn’t like getting up two hours before the sun did!
Dad always got up early to commute to his job at what was then the Defense Mapping Agency. Our schedules worked out that day for him to give me a ride since my car was in the shop.
Even though Dad commuted to work early, he wasn’t any more of an early-morning person than I was. So, as he dropped me off that cold, wintry morning, he joked, “This is for the birds.”
I half-chuckled and half-grumbled back my agreement as I exited his Ford Escort to wait for the bus. He then drove on to work.
