Another Anniversary

I can't believe it's been eight years since my father died.  Sometimes, I can't even remember his voice.

He comes to me in different ways now.  I find him in the smell of clothes, in long stretches of Missouri countryside, and in newspaper articles about politics.  While my father later worked in the corporate world, he began his career as the political reporter for the Kansas City Star and the editor of Congressional Quarterly, and some of my most prized possessions are the old newspaper and magazine articles that he wrote.

To be frank, I don't know if my dad would have approved of me leaving my job as a lawyer, so that I could skip off to London to write, to take pictures, and to do God-knows-what.  It's hard for me to think about that.  But then, this is part of being an adult.  Growing up, living my own life.

And then sometimes I think my dad would have understood my decision to move to London.  When I was working for Congressman Ike Skelton, the Democrats received an embarrassingly sound drubbing from the Republicans in the 2004 election cycle -- losing both the Presidency and seats in Congress.  Everyone in Ike's office was dumbstruck.  It was eerily quiet.  

The rest of the day was slow in the office, so I called my dad and vented my frustration about the election.  Mid-way through my venting, my father interrupted, "You should write all of this down."  "Write about it?" "Yes, your thoughts about why it happened, its effect on the country, etcetera."  "You want me to write a paper about all that?" "Well, not a paper.  Maybe something like a newspaper article or a column."  "Okay, but am I going to publish this somewhere?  Who am I writing this for?"  "Who knows. Yourself?"