I was thirty when Dad passed away, and now at thirty-two, our last conversation still aches as if it were just yesterday.
Id always been the troublesome childconstantly starting things and never seeing them through.
I attended three different courses at three separate universities.
I left the first one in my second term, bored out of my mind.
The second, I dropped in the fourth, having slipped into a habit of skipping lectures, partying too much, losing focus.
The third I abandoned before the first term even ended.
While my two sisters graduated, secured jobs, and moved steadily on, I leapt from one idea to another, one plan to the next, repeating the mantra, Ill find my thing. Everyone at home saw it, but the one who felt it deeply was Dad.
He was more than my fatherhe was my mate.
Hed take me out for a game of pool, to football matches, for pints on the weekends, for barbecues with his mates.
My sisters had tight schedules, grades, responsibilities.
With me, it was different.
Youre a lad, youll learn on the streets, hed say.
I grew up free, without proper rules, without real pressure.
And over time, that freedom betrayed me.
I didnt know how to stick at anythingneither at university, nor at work, nor in finding a steady rhythm.
Three months before he left, we had the hardest talk of my life.
We were sitting in the back garden.
He was smoking; I was staring at my phone.
He asked me to put it away.
Told me, Son, Im not disappointed in you.
Im disappointed in myself.
I raised you wrong.
I spoiled you.
I saved you from hardship.
I made you soft for this world. I was silent.
My eyes burned, but I didnt cry.
I wanted so desperately to say something strong, something maturebut nothing came out, just that I promised to change.
He didnt reply, just stared at the grass.
Three months later, on a normal morning, he got up, went to brush his teeth, and collapsed on the bathroom floor.
It was sudden.
No chance for goodbyes.
No hospital, no final words.
I lost not just a fatherI lost the only person who kept believing I could pull myself together, even when he was tired of waiting.
After the funeral, I grew furious with myself.
I stopped going out.
Quit drinking.
Stopped wasting my days.
Enrolled again, this time to study law.
I needed to prove something.
I wake up at five, work part-time, study at night.
Some days I barely eat, but I keep going.
Every exam I take, I do it thinking of him.
Every passed module feels like telling him, See?
I can do this.
Two years have passed.
Im making progress.
I dont miss terms, dont skip lectures, dont look for excuses.
My sisters watch me differently now and support me.
Mum tells me Dad would have been proud.
Im not sure about proudbut at least he wouldnt have left thinking everything was a failure.
The hardest part isnt the studying, or the work, or the exhaustion.
The toughest thing is not being able to call him and say I passed a tough exam, that Im doing well, that Im living differently now.
He was my partner in adventurethe one who taught me to live without fear, and, without meaning to, left me without structure.
Now its my turn to build it myself.
Sometimes, when I come home late with my backpack heavy with books, I sit on my bed and look at a photo of us on a countryside walkpints in hand, big smiles.
And every time I think, Old man, I didnt manage to prove it to you in time, but you werent completely wrong about me.
I want to be the best version of myself for him.
I hope Ill get there.
