10 Years Since My Dad Left
Sunday, April 26, 2026 marked 10 years since my Dad crashed his motorcycle at the Hoover Dam, Nevada.
I was 28 and living and working in Costa Rica, where I’d been for the last 3.5 years of my life. He was making plans to visit me. I was thinking about growing my roots there even deeper.
And then, in the blink of an eye, he was gone. And the story I had started writing there came to an abrupt ending.
Last week my family and I thought about how we should commemorate our Dad’s passing. My sister had the idea that we should go to the boat club that we grew up at. My Dad loved the water and loved our boat. Most of our most cherished childhood memories were spent out there.
So, on Sunday, I loaded my Mom, sister and their 2 dogs, plus my 2 kids into our VW Buzz and drove out to New Rochelle. We reminisced about the drive. How the excitement would build as we made our way to our favorite place. We pulled into the lot and neared the place we’d always park. We noticed the boat bins that our Dad would load with our luggage; We lived on the boat for 2 months of the summer.
We joked about how often we’d forget our pet dog, Missy, in the parking lot. Or, worse, at the boat dock. And we did eventually get her a life jacket. (Ok, on occasion we found her in the water). She survived :)
As we entered the marina, my kids gravitated naturally to the things I did as a kid - scaling the wall by the pool. Running through the open field picking dandelions. I walked slowly watching them, taking it in - them being me-…imagining how I was, perhaps, my Dad.
Realizing that he did all this for us.
Like I do it all now largely for them.
We made our way down to the final slip. The one that was ours.
The one that was home to King James for so many years.
All the friends we had climb up there to the back of the boat. To the bow. Playing cards in the living room. Making up games in our bedroom and the bunk beds he built from scratch. Making chips & dips in the kitchen. Camping on the top. Jumping off naked into Hamburg Cove. The ducklings we’d feed off the swim platform.
My Dad showing us how to disconnect the power lines and turn on the generator. The sound of the engine starting. My Dad pulling out the charts and (attempting to ) teach us how to read the waters.
My Mom tells us the story of how they picked out the boat. How he had worked in the Daily News for so long he would notice the rising prices of homes and boats. How he told her he found a good deal that they needed to go see. How we all drove as a young family to City Island and scoped out the yacht. How my Mom asked, “Do you even know how to drive a boat this big?” And he said, “No, but I’ll learn.” And she said, “Okay.” And there you have it. We owned a 42 ft Carver and that was that.
Not only did he learn how to drive a boat that big, he also learned how to run the ENTIRE engine room by himself. We never had help. Of course then he proceeded to learn how to Scuba dive (in the boat club pool, much to a tween’s dismay) so that he could fix any issues underneath the boat.
My Dad was crazy. And my Dad was oh so cool.
We lulled around the whole boat club that Sunday. Besides for a guy or two fixing something around the pool, no one was there. And no one said anything to us. My Dad lived largely by the virtue “ask for forgiveness instead of permission” (for better or worse - many times, worse).
We reminisced about ping pong tournaments, shuffle board fights, late night pool dips, roasting marshmallows, chasing fireflies, the disappeared-tennis courts, and the suspicious house out back.
And my kids walked through it all with us, somehow carrying this history forward with them in a way I might not exactly know right now.
Then we crossed the street to the park by the water that we visited from time to time as kids. Well, first we stopped to feed 13 stray cats that my kid spotted.
And we picnicked. And the kids ran to the giant rock by the water that my sisters and I used to love to run to. We watched kite and dogs running by. We shared our favorite stories about our Dad. The boat rides. The train set. Sledding (on his back). Working around the house outside. We shared how funny he was. How scary he was sometimes. And how very lucky we are.
My kids didn’t whine or complain the whole day. They jumped in and out of the car several times as needed. We didn’t rush a thing. Somehow, it was the perfect day. We had no real plans. It all came together spontaneously. We just went with the flow as my Dad loved to say.
For the first time in a long time, I felt at peace with my Dad’s absence. Because in a way it was like he was there with us. It was like how he’d always wanted it to be. It was like they say, he was all around us.
And I just keep getting this message to slow down. To slow down even slower than you think you should slow down. See if your mind and body are in the same place. Take time to really look at what your kids are doing. Try to feel what they might be feeling. Try to really be with them. With the people around you. Without trying to fix anything and before you think about the next thing. Linger longer. Try to face the sun and take a long, full breath. Find the color purple somewhere around you. Take a minute to wonder about the nest the bird is building.
The last time I spoke to my Dad was through a text message. I had poured out a puzzle on my table in my house in Atenas, Costa Rica. And I sent him a text saying that one of my favorite memories with him was picking out a coffee can puzzle in our basement and bringing it upstairs to do together.
I like to think that he knew how much he meant to me.
That his story is being carried forward in me.
In us.
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Hello Friends,
(I write this as if I am, in fact, talking to you as a friend. I hope you will read it as such).