I wrote this for my father's first anniversary. Tomorrow is father's day...I'd like to post it in honor of him...

to you, dad...

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"Gardening: I am, the fruit of my father..."

When I was growing up, well into my adulthood. I could never understood WHY people loved gardening. I mean, I enjoyed the beauty of the flowers and the bushes and plants and I enjoyed eating the fruits of people’s labors. But I just couldn't see myself getting down knee deep into the dirt (hey, that’d ruin my jeans!); nor made myself digging with my hands into the dirt (the thoughts of worms crawling beneath the dirt would make me shiver. And hey! I’d get dirt under my nails!! Yuck!); nor pictured myself wearing those silly sun hats or holding a tiny shovel that looked like something that belonged to Alice in Wonderland, where it should be the "Queen."

Images of Rosa, a neighbor that lived two doors down from me when I was in college, clad in her flowery sunhat, kneeling on her one bad knee (actually, I think both knees were bad), while holding up her tiny spade that I called a spatula (she’d always correct me," that’s a mini-spade, not a spatula!") in one hand and waving while the other hand clinging to a sunflower, or a bush-twig, or some sorta plant along with her dirt covered face as I drove by her house, always made me smiled, AT her.

I’d always nod at her and yell out my window, “hi Ms. Rosa! What are you planting today?” She’d often smile and yell back at me for me to come and help her get up because of her bad knees. That image never left my mind beyond my college years.

I’d often thought, what a sweet but DUMB lady? She had bad knees and fair skin, what the heck was she doing in dirt and out under the hot sun? What kind of life was that??

Me, I'd rather sit inside insulated by the cool air conditioner with a tall glass of iced tea. Now that, is life!

I could remember neighbors or friends that gardened would always bring us the product of their labors: veggies, fruits, flowers. And I was always amazed at how fresh the veggies and fruits were, or how much prettier the flowers were compared to the ones you’d find at the florists.

But I sure was glad that there were someone out there that were willing to get down and dirty! "Better them than me!" I'd often thought to myself, " I’ll just sit here and enjoy THEIR fruits of labor."

My father passed away on July 5th, 2003. He died a miserable and lonely man. Congested heart failure and diabetes robbed him of his health and made him weak and emaciated.

In the last 18 months of his life, I saw an otherwise healthy man, losing over 80 lbs almost overnight, sleeping only an hour or two a day, falling into a major depression that he didn’t even realized he had, turned into someone that looked like a total stranger to me.

This was NOT the man that I knew?! The muscular, strong, often times smart-alec, and sometimes mean father? No, not this frail, pathetic looking man?? It was like watching a flower withering away right in front of me…

My father shared the same philosophy toward gardening as I did. He hated dirt. Now, He loved to dig dirt for worms to fish with cause he looooved to fish. But digging into dirt to plant something?? Forget about it…

But before he became so debilitated, he, GARDENED…

About three years before he passed away, I saw my father and my mother planted a tiny vegetable/fruit garden in their backyard. He’d just gotten news of his congested heart failure and was forced to quit his job.

This was a man that had ADHD and couldn't sit still for one second to save his life. So, my mother suggested to him that they’d garden to keep his times occupied. Besides, the benefits of eating his products appealed to him.

So, there they were, planting and sweating and I would just watch and smile and shake my head. I was working nights plus extra jobs; I could barely keep my head above water.

So, "don't even bother asking me to help," I'd thought.

The man that was my father, changed in front of my eyes…he’d go outside religiously and watered daily, pulling weeds while getting down and dirty. And whenever I’d see him bring in the “children.” He’d have such satisfaction over his face that I’d rarely seen as if he had won the lottery...

The youngest of 10 children, his father had him at a late age and seemed to have abandoned him emotionally.

He was raised by mean dogmatic brothers, and canonistic sisters. He seemed to have searched his whole life for a sense of belonging but never seemed to have found.

He was always the life of a party. Always the first one to start a game, or sing, or clown around. He wasn’t shy to take the microphone during a tour bus ride when the tour guide asked for a volunteer to sing other tourists on to ease the long hours on the bus.

He was always the show-off and was considered the comedian of the group. Some said that I have gotten my sense of humor from him. I didn’t realize that until after the end of his life.

Yet, he died lonely and without friends…none of his “friends” showed at his funeral. No co-workers, no one…

only his family (one brother and one sister and some nephews and nieces showed) and immediate family and the friends of ours(that didn't even knew him) showed. The man, whom tried become popular, or in a better sense, loved, died an irony of what he thrived for…

But I saw the joy on his face whenever he’d take in his “edible kids".

Especially the eggplants, he just loved them.

He’d sauteé them ever so gently and sniffed and whiffed the aroma while his eyes closed as if he was in heaven.

When I’d watch him sit and eat them on occasion. He was like the proudest father of all and the savoring of the flavors would flow all over his face. And I’d grin to myself and go back to bed.

Unfortunately, he got sicker and sicker with dementia and he became dangerous in the kitchen. We wouldn’t let him get near it for we’ve had too many close calls with fire. The utmost fear was that he might’ve burn himself to death if none of us were around, although we tried to make sure that someone was always at the house watching over him.

His depression took over and he became thinner and thinner, emaciated to the point of a stick. This was a man, whom, at one time I thought could take on Ali; now, wizening and dying, right in front of my very eyes…

and as he deteriorated, the garden he so loved, shared the same fate...

A few weeks before he passed away, we became closer like we’d NEVER been before.

I’d cook for him (he actually looked forwarded to my cooking). I’d spent almost all my free waking hours talking to him, trying to make him exercise, trying to boost up his spirit. I even got down into dirt…I planted a tiny rosemary bush outside the steps where he could see when he’d do his breathing exercises when he was outside.

In my heart, I had hoped that he would be able to see the rosemary grow up big, green and strong. I wanted him to have a sense of hope, to see some sort of “life” thriving in front of him. I wanted him to smell the aroma in front of him. To awaken that brain that had long been hibernating and given up.

The rosemary bush was actually given to me a year earlier by a dear friend, Tam, that passed away 6 months before my dad’s death. She loved rosemary. And when she visited me, we talked about plants and how I love to eat them but hate to plant them. So, she got me a pot of mixed herbs, with rosemary being the center piece.

The herbs came all pretty and adorned and I didn’t have to get dirty. All I needed was to water it daily. But when Tam passed away, I gave up on the plants. And they all faded away.

Interestingly enough, few weeks before my dad died, I saw the rosemary peeking its tiny green arm out…and I thought to myself, “it is a sign…” So I replanted the rosemary in hopes of a good sign.

But all signs turned into a dead end. The rosemary withered, my father wizened. And now both are underneath dirt… dirt that I have been avoiding, afraid of getting into most of my life…that’s where my dad now resides…

I was so angry the first few weeks…I was full of confusion, resentments, but most of all, questions…

“WHY???” I'd ask...

“I DON’T KNOW…” I'd answer...

“I Don’t know??” That was my answer?? I can’t accept that as my answer…I HAVE TO HAVE SOMETHING!! Look where he is, in dirt!! IN DIRT!!!!!! MY FATHER!! Whom was alive, and now, he is beneath dirt!!! And the only answer that I have is: "I DON'T KNOW???" Oh, CURSE YOU!! Ole Creator, curse you…and believe me...I cursed...

I wanted to go with into the dirt with him…my heart was beneath the dirt already…it had always been, battling my own depression and suicidal thoughts, it was buried long ago…perhaps that was why I was afraid of dirt, afraid that I would not have been able to resist of wanting to be one with dirt...

But now, I physically wanted to rip my heart out and shove it in there with him…to show him…
Show him what…that I have a heart?? That I wished I could’ve tried harder? That I wished we could’ve had more time?? That we could’ve….this and that and whatever???

TOO LATE!!

Wait…

"DIRT…"

The flowers we’d bring to him, always seemed to attract insects…butterflies and crickets and bees…

One time, I sat in front of his marker and was blinded by tears…then, I asked the WHY’s and was left with the I dunno’s… but then, when I wiped my eyes, I saw…

“LIFE…”

Wait, how could there be life at a cemetery?? It was full of dead people!! DEAD DEAD DEAD, everywhere I glanced were DEATH!! Death and DIRT, that was all I saw!!

But wait, I was WRONG!!

There IS life!! A beautiful forest rested on the backdrop of his gravesite. A beautiful garden sat in the center of the cemetery. And birds were singing in the distance, insects were chirping. Flowers were blooming. I rubbed my eyes…I smiled…

"LIFE…"

(cont. below)