The Greatest Man I Ever Knew

As a child, growing up in Toronto I never knew my father. We did not have a father figure in our lives, and I certainly never knew my father. When I was a young adult I moved to Northern Ontario, to get away from the city and my emotional environment. It was one of the best decisions I ever made. As a former foster child and crown ward, family was very important to me, yet I found myself as a single mother with a very young baby, all alone in a city I had only been to on a few other brief occasions. I met my husband shortly after moving to the strange city that I would call my hometown. I was not born in the city, nor was I raised here, but I called it my hometown nonetheless. The lessons I should have learned while being raised as a child were all taught to me in this city, and as an adult. My husband adopted my child as his own, and his family accepted my son as their own. He became more of a father to my son than his own father. His parents absorbed me into their family as a daughter more than just a daughter-in-law. I went on to learn so many life lessons from my newfound parents that I never experienced as a young child growing up. I never felt like I belonged anywhere, but I know that I belonged here. My husband and I never had a perfect relationship, but when things got hard we just worked it out and somehow always landed on our feet. Our relationship was strengthened by my mother and father-in-law who always supported us in everything we wanted in life.

About a year a ago, my father-in-law passed away. The cancer took him quickly, and I really believed that he would leave the hospital with his spry and never failing attitude. But sadly, he did not. I stayed away from the hospital, which I regret. I did not want to go to the hospital and see the strong and powerful man I had come to love as a father in that state. I think to a certain degree I was in denial, and seeing him in the hospital would have taken away that bubble that I was in. I will forever be sorry that I did not see him in his last days. One day I will see him again when I am ready to cross the veil and I hope that he can find a way to forgive me.

In the last year I began realizing what an influence my father-in-law had in my life. I watch my sons and see fleeting memories of my father-in-law. They have the very same attitudes and emotions and he once did. I see him in them everyday. I see that I too am a different person from that broken youth that I was when this family took me under their wing. I owe that to my mother and father-in-law. I really believe that my life would have been so much worse without them. Divine intervention gave me a chance in life that just appeared amidst a quiet storm, and I am truly thankful for that. I honestly believe that without this divine intervention I would have been a much harder person, possibly in prison just like my own parents had been.

My life has been very blessed, even though I do not have financial or material wealth. I have a family, when I was all alone in life. Be thankful in what you have and what you do not have will come to you eventually when you stop asking for it.