Remembering what we lost

What life was
Laval, QC
This photo originally shared on Instagram

Two years ago today, my wife lost her dad, our kids lost their Zaida Irving, and our family lost its patriarch.

Every memory I have of him either begins or ends - or both - with a smile. From him I learned that family isn't just who or what you're born into, but what you cultivate. His home was always open, he always made the time, he was always there, even when we pulled into town at an ungodly hour.

To our kids, he was everything, and it is their deeply rooted memories of him that have helped somewhat ease the pain of losing him. He planted some profound seeds in them, and having him in their lives made them better people as a result.

I took this photo as my wife and I were cleaning out his condo last year. At various points in the process, I found myself hovering over things, trying to remember their significance, trying to commit that feeling to permanent memory.

The top of the hutch in the bedroom was almost like a rogue's gallery of a life well lived, a glimpse into where his and my mother-in-law's life together started, and how it evolved.

And as I stood there in the silence of a place where everything was now in the past, I felt some comfort that we became who we became largely because of the life he decided to live.

We continue to do our best to honor his memory, and we're limitlessly thankful to have had him for as long as we did.

Still, it's entirely human to wish we could have had him longer.

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