How Do You Miss Someone You Don't Know?

I often wondered how I would feel if and when I got the news that my father had died. It was three years ago today when I got the call. I remember reading the funeral home online guest book and feeling like it was the first glimpse I was getting of his life. People sharing kind words to which I could not relate.

I have but one memory of time with my father. I was in my early 20's and visiting family in West Virginia when we met. I was young and immature (even though I didn't think so at the time) and I was meeting my father who was really just a stranger who shared my DNA. I couldn't really take it all in. I was numb for the most part and simply trying to wrap my brain around the encounter with people I was to call father, sister, grandparent, aunt and uncle. I didn't & couldn't understand the significance of the opportunity until many years later.

Honestly, if it weren't for a Facebook status I wouldn't have even remembered it was the anniversary of his death. So today I will mourn just a bit, not for the father I didn't know, but for the possibility of a relationship that never was.