My entire life my father fought against the lure of alcohol and 98% of the time the alcohol won. Alcohol or any addiction can and usually does tear a family to pieces leaving the addicted alone and separated from family and friends Sadly not seeking treatment for an addiction is, to an outsider, a choice that does have very real consequences and the wounded outsiders are willing to let the chips fall where they may. Over time everyone grows tired of the abuse and slowly people just drift away disconnecting from the addicted leaving them alone to sleep in the bed they’ve made for themselves.

Yesterday I came face to face with that cliche as I literally saw the bed my father had made and died in 4 days earlier. I had spent the morning getting mentally prepared for what I would see when I walked through the door of what had been his home for the past 8 months. I was very prepared to break down at the sight of the first familiar thing, his coat, a hat, a picture or something that either he or my mother held dear. What I was not prepared for was the lack of empathy I felt and still feel that he had been dead for 4 days and no one knew it. Could be that I’m not supposed to feel anything at all. After all, when you accept the choices that someone else makes you also have to accept the consequences of those choices and I guess over time I had reconciled both.

As I looked around his tiny apartment I felt next to nothing, there was no remorse, no sadness, no empathy only a small amount of anger. Anger that he had not kept more things that belonged to my mother. I was annoyed that her touch was missing and was sickened by the smell.

The plan yesterday for Steve and I was to get into his apartment, locate his will (Steve has the dubious task as executor), financial papers, life insurance papers and access what was there. Today the plan is to go back and begin removing the contents from his apartment all the while sorting out what is good and what is garbage. There will be no big estate sale, my brother wants nothing from the apartment and well, neither do I. We are the only remaining relatives from my parents and if cousins want to fly here to pick through his stuff they are more than welcome to  but there is nothing left of value.

Today and the days ahead we had to find out how many more credit companies he owed 10s of thousands of dollars to and if there is any money left to fulfill my father’s promise to my brother. It’s somewhat tragically funny how a life can change from something so familiar to something so strange in just a few short months.