Tuesday 30 October 2012

RIP Dad

Two weeks ago tomorrow after my 9 am lecture I got a phone call from my mum telling me that my dad had died of a heart attack. I don't tend to write about my personal life on the blog yet on this occasion I shall make an exception. Anyone that knows me knows that I am quite the fighter and undying optimist which has meant that in the days that followed I tried everything to continue my daily life, following my fashion and university obligations and offering  my mum the support and  fighting spirit she needed to deal with the immediate aftermath. I don't like to open up about my feelings or show weakness and have only told a handful of people close to me, one reason in particular for this being my dislike of the resulting  well intentioned yet often awkward sympathy I would be at the receiving end of.  This blog post is hence more for me than you the reader, a way to pen my feelings that  I may not be able to share in conversation but that still need to be aired in order to process and eventually, as is human nature, move on. 

Me and my dad had a far from easy relationship, for one he thought I was wasting my time with fashion and failed to understand why I would choose it as career, something that especially since I moved to London for university two years ago meant we didn't talk a lot and caused me to develop a lot of resentment towards him. He was a very complex human being and far from the perfect father figure or family man which has made loosing him the more complex, the many unresolved issues I hold against him irrevocably linked with the loss of the dad that I spent few yet unforgettable childhood days with and who engrained my love for electronic music and Quentin Tarantino films in me. Despite our issues I have always sought his approval, whether achieving  straight A's or getting into UCL, something that I will continue to do, a drive to succeed that I have to thank him for. 

And that's what it comes down to I think, of course he wasn't perfect and a rose tinted view of him is impossible but its the finality of this loss and the fact that I no longer can prove him wrong about my love for fashion that despite all his faults will make me miss him dearly. 

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