I was thirty when Dad passed away and went to meet his maker.
Now Im thirty-two, yet our last conversation still aches as if it happened only yesterday.
I was always labelled the troubled childnever finishing what I started, always bouncing from one thing to the next.
I studied three different subjects at three different universities.
The first I abandoned in my second term, bored with it.
The second fell through in the fourth term; I started skipping classes, going out too much, drifting away.
The third I gave up before the first term was even finished.
While my two sisters graduated, got their degrees, and moved into proper jobs, I jumped between ideas, plans, always repeating, Ill find my thing soon enough. Everyone at home could see it, but Dad felt it most keenly.
He was my personnot just my father but my mate.
Hed take me to play snooker, to football matches, for a pint on weekends, barbecues with his friends.
My sisters had schedules, grades, responsibilities; with me, it was different.
Youre a lad, hed say, youll learn your lessons on the street. I grew up free, without strict rules, without pressure.
As the years went on, though, that freedom turned against me.
I never learned how to stick with anythingnot studies, not jobs, not a daily routine.
Three months before he left us, we had the hardest conversation of my life.
We were sitting in the back garden.
He was smoking; I was scrolling on my phone.
He asked me to put it away.
Then he said, Son, Im not disappointed in you, Im disappointed in myself.
I raised you wrong.
Spoiled you, shielded you from hardships.
Made you too soft for life. I sat in silence, my eyes prickling, but I didnt cry.
I wanted to say something grown-up, something meaningful, but nothing came out except, I promise Ill change. He didnt reply.
Just stared down at the grass.
Three months later, on an ordinary morning, he got up, went to brush his teeth, and collapsed.
It was suddenno goodbyes, no hospital, no last words.
I didnt just lose my father; I lost the only person who still believed I could pull myself together, even when he was too tired to keep waiting.
After the funeral I was furious at myself.
I stopped going out.
Stopped drinking.
Stopped wasting time.
I enrolled againthis time in law, needing to prove something.
Now I get up before dawn, work part-time, study in the evenings.
There are days I barely eat, but I keep going.
Every exam I pass, I think of him.
Every credit gained feels like saying, See, I can do it.
Its been two years.
Im making progress.
No missed terms, no skipped lectures, no excuses.
My sisters see me differently now; they support me.
Mum says Dad would be proud.
Maybe he would bebut at least he wouldnt leave thinking it was all a failure.
The hardest part isnt the studying, not the work, not the exhaustion.
The hardest part is not being able to call him and say I passed a tough exam, that I did well, that things are different now.
He was my partner in adventuresthe one who taught me not to fear life, but also the one who, unwittingly, left me without structure.
Now its up to me to build that structure myself.
Sometimes, when I come home late with a rucksack full of textbooks, I sit on my bed and look at a photo of the two of usout walking, each with a pint in hand, smiling.
I always think silently, Old man, I didnt manage to prove it to you in time, but you werent completely wrong about me.
I just want to be the best version of myself for him.
I hope I finally will be.
