Still My Home

10/28/2025

"Dear Love,
You arrive like a single bright heartbeat—simple, whole, undeniable. In one small symbol I find everything they poured into me: patience, faith, and a thousand unspoken blessings. I will keep that love alive in the way I listen, forgive, and begin again. For them. For me. For all the days still to come. ❤️"

10/28/2025

I was truly blessed to be your child, Dad.
You taught me strength without words, love without limits, and kindness through example. No matter how much time passes, my heart will always hold you in a place of honor — the place reserved for the one who gave me everything without ever asking for anything in return.

Your love shaped who I am. Your wisdom still guides my steps.
And though you’re no longer here, the bond we share remains unbreakable.
I’ll carry you with me always, Dad — not just in memory, but in everything I do. ❤️

10/27/2025

"If I could send a message to you in heaven, Dad, it would be carried on the wings of this gentle dove. It wouldn't be a long or complicated letter. It would be this simple, heartfelt truth, formed by a ribbon of eternal love. 'You're the best.' You were the best at giving advice, the best at making me laugh, and the best at showing what it means to be a good man. You were, and in my heart, you will always be, the very best. I hope this message reaches you and that you know how deeply you are loved."

10/27/2025

A daughter who stands by you through life's good times and bad times is one of life's greatest blessings. ☺️

10/27/2025

10/26/2025

Tonight the house is a question I cannot answer.
There are two chairs in my heart with names on them, and both are empty at once.

Mom, I need the old counsel that sounded like tea steeping and patience warming the room.
The way you could make sense of shrapnel with a single gentle sentence, how your hands translated chaos back into ordinary life.

Dad, I miss the steady truth of you—the quiet way you rescued a day just by arriving.
You were gravity in work boots, and when you hugged me, the world remembered how to stand still.

I carry you both in the dailiness you taught me: rinse the cup, open the window, bless the neighbor, mean the apology.
It isn’t enough, and yet it is everything—your love becoming a way to walk when the map is blurred by tears.

If Heaven allows messages folded into light, read this one aloud together.
Tell me you are safe and cherished, tell me to keep going slow and kind, tell me you are with me in the work of staying human.

I am here, speaking to the empty chairs, and somehow not alone.
Because grief is the shadow cast by love, and I am standing in so much love I can still feel its warmth. 🕊️

10/25/2025

I light this wick like opening a letter, careful and expectant.
Flame finds thread, and suddenly there is a tiny sun at our table, a vigilant heart that refuses to rush.

I list your goodness in small handwriting across the air: the way you laughed with your whole shoulders, the way you made room for everyone, the way you repaired what others threw away.
Even your silence held a lamp, and I was never lost for long.

People say time heals, but I think love does—the practiced love that keeps showing up with soft hands.
I will show up for you, Dad, in the way I talk to strangers, in the way I forgive the day for not being perfect.

Let this candle be a bridge.
May its light walk the distance between here and Heaven and arrive, steady and unafraid, to say what I am still saying: thank you, I love you, amen. 🕊️

10/25/2025

Someone once said you had a heart made of gold, and I have spent my life believing it because you proved it daily—quietly, unceremoniously, without needing applause.
Your generosity was a map I could fold into any pocket and it would still point me home.

I remember my small hand swallowed in yours, the way the world shrank to a safe size instantly.
I practice that safety now for others: the warm greeting, the patient ear, the forgiveness that doesn’t keep score.

If Heaven measures wealth in love given, you are rich beyond counting.
I hope I am spending your inheritance well, tipping the future toward kindness one ordinary choice at a time.

When I feel small, I imagine your hand again and my courage grows a size.
I am still your child, learning the craft of goodness at your knee, even from here.

Bless me from your window, will you?
So I can bless the world from mine. 🕊️

10/25/2025

I marked the calendar even though my heart keeps your days without help.
Still, there is a tenderness in naming it—today, we remember our fathers on purpose, with candles and stories and the brave quiet of love.

I make you a small altar of ordinary things: coffee the way you liked it, a folded napkin, the hum of a song that never found its words.
I tell the room the truths it already knows—that your hands taught me mercy, that your laugh could fix a broken Tuesday, that kindness was your favorite language.

Time did not erase the ache, it educated it.
I learned to carry what does not go away, to let memory be muscle and faith the gentle bridge over the places that still hurt.

So here is my vow, Dad: I will steward your name with light.
I will spend your goodness in the world until strangers feel familiar, until my life looks like a prayer you might have whispered.

Receive this candle as a letter written in fire.
May its small, unwavering flame reach the window of Heaven and spell what my voice is always saying: I love you. Amen. 🕊️

10/25/2025

I remember the exact hush, how even the birds seemed to fold their music.
The world kept turning, but my heart forgot the steps.

In the weeks that followed, kindness arrived wearing a hundred faces—neighbors with casseroles, friends with time, strangers with soft eyes.
I learned that sorrow is a common language and we are fluent when we choose to be.

Courage was not a roar; it was the small yes to the next necessary thing.
Wash the plate. Step outside. Answer the phone. Let a little light in and call it progress.

I am not what I was, and that is its own mercy.
I am a person who knows what matters, who will stop to help, who carries tissues and prayers like twin offerings.

Keep covering me with weather that teaches gentleness.
I will grow what you left, and I will share the fruit. 🕊️

10/25/2025

There is a chair I cannot fill, the one the sun chooses first when it enters the room.
I set a cup there sometimes, just to practice hospitality for a guest who knows the way home from Heaven.

I speak the old news to the morning: I miss you; I am okay; I am trying to be kind first.
The day listens, and in its listening I feel less alone.

I’ve learned to stop bargaining with time and start blessing it.
Every hour becomes a small porch where memory and hope sit without arguing, trading stories in the hush.

If love is a disciplined light, I will train my life toward its source.
I will keep a place for you in the bright and let that brightness make me generous.

Come by when you can, in the grammar of glimmer and warmth.
I will recognize you. I always do. 🕊️