The Most Important Book ~ An International Authors Day Post

If I were asked to describe the father I barely knew, the words that followed (take them as you will) would include references to Ansel Adams, Roger Miller, and Bill Murray. I'd smile as I recalled backyard picnics and homemade ice cream, guitar music and cigarette smoke. He loved animals, collected cameras, and was always ready with a good-mannered joke or a helping hand.

Of course, you'd have to take such rose-colored memories with a grain of salt.

I was ten he died of lung cancer. As everyone who has lost someone is bound to understand, processing grief can be a difficult thing for a child. Even now, it's little more than an uncomfortable series of foggy images without context. More than enough to make me recognize the fallibility of memory.