I’ve never been big on Father’s Day. I always told myself it was just another capitalist trap. Another way to equate love with spending and packaging something deep and unquantifiable into novelty socks, beard oil, and yet another mug or some other thing you don’t need. But since my dad died three years ago, the day feels inescapable. Every June, the emails arrive. Every shop has a grandiose display of gifts for Dad. Yes, some brands do their bit to acknowledge the grief that some of us may be feeling through the offer of unsubscribing if you’d rather avoid said content. But a click barely softens the ache of loss.
Father’s Day and my dad’s birthday sit side by side on the calendar, and this year, I spent the lead-up to both travelling to Jamaica. I was there for the Calabash Literary Festival, which is just 45 minutes from my family home. I’d been deliberately avoiding Jamaica for two and a half years. The last time I went, it was with a duty: to scatter his ashes, just as he asked. I visited his house, stayed two days, completed the act, and then practically ran. The thought of existing in his space without him was simply unbearable. Jamaica was his, and since he was no longer here, I wasn’t sure what was left. What of him still lived there, and what, if anything, could belong to me?
Jamaica’s where my dad was born, where he was raised, and a place I think he loved just as much as he loved his children. It was a love he wanted me to know. My memories of him are rooted there. It’s where we spent the most time together. From the age of nine, he’d take me as often as he could afford. Back on his homeland, he introduced me to the foods he grew up on: corned beef with hardo bread, beef patties, chicken foot soup. He showed me the sights: Pelican Bar, YS Falls, Dunn’s River - but even as a child, it wasn’t the tourist spots that stayed with me. It was eating fried fish at Alligator Pond. Boiling crabs in his kitchen. Sitting side by side on the veranda, putting the world to rights. That was his Jamaica. His great love.
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Once I reached adulthood and he’d retired and moved back home, it was those moments I’d crave — especially as work became increasingly demanding. I’d save whatever I could and visit, just to spend a little time sitting on the veranda, feeling the breeze, talking and doing nothing in particular. My father had to return to the UK for treatment, and before he died, getting him back to Jamaica one last time was more than a bit of a struggle. By this stage, he was already having to use a CPAP machine to breathe and needed care. He had been a bus driver for most of his life, always moving, always transporting others. But motor neurone disease had taken his mobility, and fast. Getting him onto that plane took weeks of preparation: wheelchairs, breathing machines, medication, care rotas, stairs.
Once we arrived, I saw his face light up with relief and fear. He was back on his land but equally aware of the inevitability of his decline. I drove him around the island so he could see his friends and sit on his beloved veranda.
So to return to that place without him felt unthinkable. In my mind, I had reasoned, decided that walking into my father’s home again would be the saddest thing I could do. That it would pull me apart. Undo me. That every corner of the house would remind me of the heartbreak of losing him. Of watching his body change in ways I couldn’t have imagined. Of witnessing him fight his condition with unrelenting bravery, despite its cruelty. It would remind me of the finality of death.
But I was somewhat mistaken. As I stepped off the plane, the heat met me instantly. The sun clung to my skin, and it felt like he was there, welcoming me back. I’ve always had a thing about sunshine and my dad. Whenever I find a small patch of light, streaming through a window or sitting in the branches between trees, I can’t help but think of him. His gentleness. His bright, mischievous smile. To know my dad was to feel a love steady and wide.
This man, who left school at 11, who worked endless night shifts, returned home and built a sanctuary for himself on the land he loved. And by doing so, he gave me something I hadn’t understood until now: a place where I can return to him again and again. Of course it was a little-strange to be in his home without him but I felt more at peace, more comforted by being there than I thought I would.
I remember a photo of him standing next to the home he’d built and the mango sapling he had just planted. It’s a joyous image and it barely reached his knees. Now, that mango tree is bearing fruit, which I enjoyed messily, joyously on my recent trip. I swam in the water where my brothers and I scattered his ashes, close to a great coconut tree. I visited the friends and family that made him. We shared our stories of him and expressed our disbelief that he’s no longer here.
Jamaica feels different now, but that doesn’t mean bad. This time around I relished my time there. Each moment spent is an invitation to add my stories to his and to build a version of Jamaica that belongs to me too and just like he showed me his Jamaica - this is the one my future children will inherit.
I know now that returning to his home isn’t something to be feared. Just like his Julie mangos, it’s a place to be savoured. A safe haven. As long as I touch grass in Jamaica, or feel sunshine on my skin I know that my beautiful sunny dad is with me.
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