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I got an email from my cousin’s husband today.
It said “I found these papers that seem to have been written by your
father. Do you know anything about them? And, are there any more?”
He attached the scans of two different letters.
I opened the letters to look.

It was like someone hit me over the head with a baseball bat.

25 years ago my father had his first stroke and thought he was going to
die. As he recovered from it I convinced him to write down some of the
stories he had from when he was young.
Once a week he wrote me a letter. For a while, each week he included an
extra page that was a story from his youth.

At the time I was working in New Hampshire while my (now) wife was still
here in Massachusetts. So, I had a lot of spare time during the week when
I was alone in NH.
So, I typed the stories he sent me into the computer.

When I lost that job I moved back in with my (now) wife. Before we got
married we lived in an old apartment building with a lot of roommates. I
had the smallest room and so needed to find a place for my things.
My parents offered to let me store things at their house.

Those things were still there a few years later when they declared me an
embarrassment to the family and I disowned them.

Some time after that I got a note from my mother saying she had “thrown out
all that old junk” I had kept there.
The desk that had all those stories was in that collection.

(This did not stop her from trying to lure me home with promises of it 2
years ago, but I’m reasonably sure that it was all gone soon after my
father died in 2000.)

The items my cousin sent me were scans of some of those stories.
Only a few pages. Probably 10% at most of what there had been.
But, I had never, ever, expected to see any of it again.

I can still remember typing them on hot summer nights a quarter of a
century ago. Trying to figure our my father’s hand writing. Especially as
he was recovering from a stroke and it was even worse than normal.
It was far, far harder to try and make sure I converted them accurately
than it is just to write things as they spill from my head.

I have no idea how many hours I spent typing in those stories. I know it
was more than 100 pages of them, and I didn’t get them all transcribed
before I lost the job and it was put into storage.

I also don’t know how they got to my cousin. They were in my Aunt
Gertrude’s things. Maybe I shared them with my aunt? Maybe my father did?
I do vaguely recall talking with her about them. So, maybe I sent them to
her.
And, her daughter took them when she passed 14 years ago.

But, seeing them again really hit me hard.
Not because they are my father’s words 15 years after he died.
But, because the me I had been when I was typing them 25 years ago. Back
when I was still trying to connect with my father. Back before he called
me an embarrassment and I thought I could still manage to have a
relationship with him.
Back before I went to my sister for his sake and ruined my relationship
with her.

I regret the loss of my parents, long before they died. (My mother still
has not as far as I know.)
To get something back from that time…
I really don’t have any words for how it makes me feel.
But, it is strong. Not all bad. Far from all good.
In the end, I’m glad it was found and shared.