My father: 10 years on

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Col. Richard Lee Alley, USAF, 4-13-1920 to 2-11-2009

My father, United States Air Force full bird Colonel Richard Lee Alley, passed away ten years ago, on this day. February 11th, 2009.

He was 88 years old. He missed his 89th birthday by less than two months.

This year, he would be 99 on April 13th.

I cannot, still, tell you how terribly I miss him.

He was a part of The Greatest Generation.

The generation that secured promise and freedom and liberty for not only the United States, but for the entire world at large.

At the end of his life, he proffered large decisions. I had to make many of those large decisions. One of the worst for me was deciding to take him out of his very own house. The house where me and my two other brothers were raised. The house where he clinged.

First, I had to physically take him out of his house. Where he and my family had lived — for over sixty years. He said: “goodbye house.”

I wrote about looking at my father’s face in repose.

Ten years. I can remember it like yesterday. It seems like it was yesterday. And there isn’t a day that I don’t think about Dad.

So many questions. So many questions I would loved to have asked him. But I was wrapped up in my life and didn’t realize until a year or so later how he may have played a very serious role in any number of USAF adventures on many levels.

That first night of his passing, the 11th, I had a dream. I awakened with it in my head. Carole King was singing “So Far Away.” I remember that most distinctly.

Dad passed away at 3:30 am on Wednesday, February 11th. The night before, I had been able to summon both my brothers and my wife to his bedside. Friends visited. I thought he would make it through that night. I was sure of it. My wife counseled me: “kiss him, kiss him goodnight.” But I didn’t do it. I tried to make light of his condition, that he’d be around the next day. I’ll horribly regret not kissing my father goodbye to my very own dying day, come what may.

I pondered what had happened, here. I reflected, once again, here. I thanked you, my readers, for supporting me here. My father’s funeral was documented here. There were more goodbyes for me, just selling my father’s car.

He was a member of The Greatest Generation. Those who made so many major sacrifices for our great nation, kept us safe in our beds, and kept the country strong and free. Their incredible sacrifices. Though they didn’t necessarily want to do so. He fought in B-17s. He trained in B-25s. It was almost the perfect triumvirate: his brother Jim signed up for the Army; his youngest brother Bill enlisted in the Navy (and had the USS Yorktownsink underneath him). My father went for the Army Air Force.

If you want to digest the quintessential document of sacrifice, read “With The Old Breed” by Eugene B. Sledge. Astounding. Simply astounding. Or perhaps the superior(but lesser read) Bert Stiles book: “Serenade To The Big Bird.”

They didn’t want to be there, they feared, they wanted to run away. And yet they persevered.

God bless you, Dad.

I think about you every day.

I can only hope, as I wrote:

I’ll bet my Dad’s flying high above the earth right now, in an open cockpit Consolidated Vultee BT-13, canopy slided back, where the skies are blue, the weather fair, and he’s young, strong and free. So free.

God bless you, Dad. Hold Mom’s hand. Step into your past, may it be untroubled and calm and fair. May your love be unfettered and limitless and beautiful. Whatever your ideal reality would be, let it be.

And I write this post through a film of tears. My throat constricts. I still miss you terribly.

What’s wrong with me? Why can’t I just let this go?

BZ

 

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10 thoughts on “My father: 10 years on”

  3. My father died in his sleep, age 64. Probably from undiagnosed sleep apnea. Drafted in WWII, served in India and Burma. Some of his service was graves registration.

    What he taught my sister and I follows: It is just a job of work. Some jobs are more unpleasant than others but they are still just a job of work that needs done. Never let the job be more than that.

    My biggest regret is my two younger sons never had a chance to get to know him.

    There are no words to diminish your loss and I won’t try.

  4. Mine has been gone 20 years this September, he too was an Air Force Pilot. To this day I will find myself reaching for the phone to tell him some news in life or ask his advice. Then, catch myself and talk to him without phone or word.
    Well remembered Zep, peace.
    RWav8r

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