A series about patterns, connections, hindsight, and those moments when scattered pieces suddenly form a bigger picture.
October 18, 2026 — Fifty-five years later
Fifty-five years ago today(*), my father died by suicide.
I was twelve.
It was his third attempt.
The last photo ever taken of my dad.
There are some things in life that cannot be undone. Death is perhaps the most absolute of them. We can spend years examining what happened, wondering what might have been different, imagining what we or others could or should have done. But eventually, if we are to continue living, we must find some way to accept what cannot be changed.
Acceptance, however, is not the same as agreement, and understanding isn’t actually required for either of them. It’s lovely when all three align, but staying stuck while waiting or hoping they do isn’t healing.
It’s consuming.
I have been thinking about that distinction a great deal lately.
I am navigating the end of a very long marriage, and with it, a legal process that has challenged some of my most fundamental assumptions about fairness, evidence, authority, and justice.
I have always believed that facts matter. That evidence matters. That the numbers need to add up. That people with authority over us have an obligation to exercise it responsibly.
I still believe those things.
What I no longer believe is that following an established process necessarily produces a just outcome.
A decision can be procedurally valid without being fair. Rules can be followed while their underlying purpose for existing is lost. Discretion can be exercised in ways that are perfectly permissible yet profoundly unjust to the people who must live with the consequences.
And once a decision has been made, the process itself can become the justification for refusing to reconsider it.
This raises questions that take up a lot of my time these days:
- What distinguishes authority from legitimacy?
- What happens when institutions prioritize procedure over justice?
- How does coercive control persist after a relationship ends?
- What is the relationship between identity, entitlement, and accountability?
- How can someone relinquish a fight without relinquishing their values?
- What does enoughness look like after a lifetime of imposed obligations?
I suspect these questions will eventually become the organizing threads of a memoir I never expected to write (but I’m definitely thinking about it now).
For now, though, I am learning something about acceptance.
I do not have to agree that an outcome is fair to accept that it has happened.
I do not have to approve of an injustice to recognize that I may lack the power to correct it.
And I do not have to surrender my values simply because continuing to fight would cost me more than I can afford to give.
There is an old prayer about accepting the things we cannot change, finding the courage to change what we can, and having the wisdom to know the difference.
I am discovering how difficult that wisdom can be.
I am also beginning to understand that the decision to stop fighting quite so hard is not necessarily defeat. Sometimes it is an act of stewardship over our own remaining lives.
I want a small life.
But that does not mean I am small.
I want a life with animals, writing, curiosity, meaningful and honest relationships, and enough peace to enjoy them.
I want a life in which my responsibilities are largely ones I have chosen, rather than obligations imposed by someone else’s decisions.
Perhaps that is what rebuilding really means.
Not erasing the past, or making peace with injustice, or even pretending that what happened “wasn’t that bad.”
Rebuilding can simply involve refusing to let what cannot be changed consume everything that still can be.
Fifty-five years after my father’s death, I am still learning how to do that.
And also fifty-five years after my father’s death, I STILL miss him.
(*) Yes, I KNOW it is no longer October the 18th. I DID write this on that day. I just was unable to publish it the same day.
