Today, Aug. 18, is my father’s birthday. He would

Today, Aug. 18, is my father’s birthday. He would have been 69 years old.

Although it has been four months since Dad died, it still doesn’t seem real. I still expect him to call the office, his ever-cheerful voice on the phone saying, “Hello Lou Hatter, Lou Hatter here.” Mom says she thinks it’s because he travelled so much — this seems like just another road trip.

But we know that this time, he won’t come back to us. There have been difficult times in the last few months — but some good times too. Our family has grown closer than ever.

In his death, as in his life, my father has taught me valuable lessons.

I thought I understood grief. My grandparents are all gone, and several aunts and uncles have passed away too. Our family has had its share of difficult deaths, like Uncle Chappell, who died in a plane crash on Christmas Eve.

Little did I know how different the loss of a parent is.

There is an emptiness inside, the void which Dad used to fill. His spirit is still there, of course, but I miss his presence terribly.

When we come up the driveway at the farm, no longer do we hear the front door open - no matter how late the hour — and see his figure silhoutted against the light streaming from the front hall. There are no more bear hugs to greet us.

As I walk around the farm with Duncan, my not-soyoung puppy, memories are everywhere: in the woodshed, with its perfect stacks separated according to each type of wood and its length. 'Hiere are short stacks for Mom’s woodstove, and longer lengths for the fireplaces. He took a lot of Iddding over that woodshed, “the department store of woodsheds,” my aunt called it.

Behind the garage in a loblolly pine tree, there’s the Christmas tree ornament he salvaged years ago from a pile of leaves. Its bright metallic finish was long ago a memory, and several smoky streaks affirm a close call with a brush burning. Most people would have pitched it in the trash, but not Dad. He carefully hung it from a branch on the pine tree, an ornament for all seasons.

There’s the pitch and putt golf course he set up around the farmhouse, with nine flags crafted from bamboo tomato stakes and white plastic freezer bags. Mom bought him some black stick-on numerals, which he carefully centered on each flag. No matter how much work we needed to do when we visited, he always made time for us to play a round.

On the fence behind the house, visible from the table on the back porch, are the two old hubcaps, found in the garage, which he turned into bird baths. They sit on wooden blocks nailed to the tops of fenceposts. A short stick juts from the hole which once held the valvestem,