KINTSUGIconversations

0:00:11 - Allison
Kintsugi is the time-honored Japanese art of repairing broken pottery with gold to highlight the beauty of imperfection.

0:00:18 - Cyndi
We believe the same is true for life and motherhood that transparent conversations can impact generational legacy. In the spirit of Kintsugi.

0:00:26 - Allison
We embrace our differences and brokenness in the everyday pieces of life because we can all turn our messes into messages and are each more valuable when repaired with care where before we were broken.

0:00:37 - Cyndi
Welcome to Kintsugi Conversations.

0:00:43 - Allison
Hi guys, welcome to another episode of Kintsugi Conversations. I am Allison and this is my mom, Cyndi. Hi, so, mom, the other day I was like on Instagram and I noticed that Coco that's my mom, Cyndi, that's my sister for all of you guys that don't know posted a story on her Instagram that just like took me all the way back. She was basically sharing how like she likes to start some Saturdays at the car wash because, you know, on Saturday mornings daddy would pick up all the cars, kind of one by one, and take them to cactus. And she and I were kind of joking about like cactus Saturdays, about how like he was going to get all the cars washed on Saturdays. And then she was like, yeah, you know, with dad, like you know, saturday by noon like we had washed all the cars and gone to brunch, gotten the dry cleaning area, dry cleaning done, stopped at Shield Meat Market to get meat for dinner, gone to Justin's for a meeting and invited like 20 people over for a small gathering just like all before noon.

That was just kind of like a normal Saturday with Charles Mathis and it just got me to thinking, of course, about you know, daddy, and about our, I guess, old life, for lack of a better word, you know, it's just you know. Whenever, like I'm reminded of times like those, I'm like wow, like it feels like it was just yesterday that he was here, but it also feels kind of like forever ago.

0:02:11 - Cyndi
Yeah, it was so funny you say that because say that to him sorry, my tongue is getting tied because last week I was at a doctor's appointment and this lady kept staring at me and I'm like, okay, and finally, when I was getting ready to check out, she could just like excuse me, are you Cyndi Mathis? And I was like, yeah, I'm Cyndi Mathis Lewis now. But yes, and she was like, oh my god, I used to come to the parties at your house. Oh, I miss Charles so much. Y'all used to have such great parties. Atlanta hasn't been the same since we lost Charles. No, my god, you still look the same. It's so good to see you. Looks like you're doing well.

0:02:46 - Allison
And I was like, yeah, yeah, I mean, even on my social media I had someone I had posted, I think, a picture of Jackson and I was saying you know how Jackson looks like me. And then someone else was like oh yeah, you know, I'm an attorney and I remember your dad like Jackson looks so much, you know, like your dad to me, and that's something that I get all the time is people saying that Jackson looks like my dad, which really I look like my dad, and so that's kind of how that he has a lot of his mannerisms too.

Yeah, for sure, and his little fat feet.

0:03:17 - Cyndi
Yes, frankfist on feet.

0:03:19 - Allison
But you know, gosh, it's 2023, so it's been 13 years since daddy passed away and then seemed like his birthday is approaching. How old would he have been turning this year?

0:03:31 - Cyndi
He's out be turning 61, so he would be. He's nine years older than me, so 70.

0:03:38 - Allison
A big birthday. I just you know, I know you probably feel the same. I remember those like early years after he passed and just feeling kind of like life would never be the same and it hasn't been, just to be honest. But you know how, when do you feel like it kind of changed for you from like my life will never go on to kind of like oh wow, I'm still here, I'm still living.

0:04:06 - Cyndi
You know I can't. It's so funny because I felt that way for so long and even though I am remarry and, you know, happy now in my, in my new life as it is, I still have those days and those moments that I'm like kind of like just judged and all those memories and just that, just that old oh gosh. You know, I really miss Charles and what would it be like if he were still here. So it, I never. I don't remember really making that, that switch or having that switch kind of flip for me. I just remember just like one day being like oh I'm smiling, oh I'm singing, and it just kind of sneaks up on you when you don't realize, which I guess is kind of a good thing.

0:04:55 - Allison
I think it's kind of like a fake it till you make it type thing too, because I remember even you know that first summer was really hard for both of us.

I know that you've shared with me before that that first summer after he passed you don't even really remember it's kind of a blur and I but I do remember that you know, friends and family kept inviting us to do things, to go places.

Like you know, somebody really close friends invited us out to Vegas that summer to spend some time and I remember that neither one of us really felt like doing any of it but we were kind of, I think even I don't even know if we ever had the conversation but I felt like we were kind of of the mindset of like we have to do this or we will be depressed. Like you know, we have to kind of put on this brave face and fake it till we make it. And I feel like, for me at least, that was really helpful, even though some days, you know, I was feeling kind of sad and putting on kind of a somewhat of a front, if you will. I feel like it was a fake it till you make it type of situation and one day, all of a sudden, I was like wait, I'm not acting.

0:05:58 - Cyndi
I really do feel happy, you know and a lot of those places too, you, like you said, getting invited to play, invited to places.

There were still so many memories of him in those places that that made it hard to do those things too, and I think you and I still as close as we are and we share so so much, we are still very protective of each other, and you know I wouldn't share a lot of you know my grief and what I was feeling, because I didn't want you to.

You know, feel like you need to take care of me, and I'm sure in your own way you were doing the same thing. You know, trying to protect me and not sharing a lot about how you were feeling with me. But you know you're right, it is a lot of fake it till you make it kind of thing, and you know grief is such a strange thing, though, because you can be going along just minding your own business, seemingly perfectly fine, and just out of the blue, you know, can hear a song or smell something or just some flash of some memory. And when I tell you sometimes those things have happened to me and they have taken me out, I have been like curled up in my bed in the fetal position, sucking my thumb, rocking back and forth. It's not running, just just the whole nine yards it's just.

0:07:22 - Allison
It's just. It's crazy how, even with it being 13 years, like sometimes, I'll kind of see someone that kind of resembles daddy, like has the same bald head, and I'll see it from the back and my initial thought will be like oh dad, like almost that it still doesn't quite feel real.

And then, of course, I'll be like wait, no, like not him, or like some, like I still have his number saved in my phone and I think I was trying to call DJ, like for one of the kids, and I accidentally said, like to Siri, call daddy, and it started dialing the number and I was like, oh wait, oh, like it took. It took a minute for me because at first I was like, oh, I'm just calling my dad, like when I, so you know, I knew that I that's what I was doing, but it took a minute for it to click that like he's not gonna answer.

And then I was like, oh wait, like you know, it just went all awry. It's just like funny.

Things like that happen sometimes. And then now Harper is and this needs to be a whole nother episode about like teaching kids about death, because Harper is I wouldn't say that she's obsessed with death by any means, that she's very curious about death and I have a picture in my room with me and my dad from when I was about seven and she always goes to the picture. She's like oh, mommy, you were so cute, thanks, harper. And then she's like oh, and look at your dad, but he's dead. And you know, she's just, she's just trying to figure it all out. But she brings it up a lot and doesn't this?

She asked not necessarily about him, but she kind of asked in her own little way about how, like, what it's like for me to have a dad that's dead. Like she's like oh, like you know where'd he go? Like well, did you miss him? Like what kind of happened? And you know I've been trying to kind of communicate to her. I'm like you know, I did miss him a lot and I was, like you know, sometimes I still miss him and she's like huh, like she finds that very interesting, okay, okay.

0:09:14 - Cyndi
Well, you know Harper is so smart though, um, and you know it only stands to reason, though, that she would have questions, because it's like you know, here's this man that I hear you guys you know talk about. Oh, remember when daddy and we did this, and so she does want to know like, oh well, why is he not here? And when you talk to kids and especially you know kids her age about you know death and people Going to heaven, you know they're like okay, so when is this place and how come I can't see it? How do you get there? And you know Harper is real big too. Now everybody on directions She'll tell me oh, to get to my school, I thought you go up here and then you make a left and then you make a right and you have to go around this circle thing and then you have to park right here because my school is in this part. You know she's real big on directions and how to get places, so you know she's like uh well, where's the road to get to heaven?

0:10:09 - Allison
Yeah, how do you get there? She asked me. She was like so, when he went to heaven, like who picked him up, like who took him? And I'm like, well, god, like you know. But she's really like is it a bus? Was it martyrs?

0:10:23 - Cyndi
Right, how do we get there? You know well, can we go visit? You know, yeah, yeah. So you know all of that makes sense. But, like I said, you know grief is such a A funny thing and you know, explaining this whole process to kids and you know they don't understand. You know, sometimes, you know when you may have these memories and you kind of get sad and stuff, you know it's like, um well, why are you sad? You know, I don't, I don't she. It's hard for them to make the connection. I can't see this person. So I don't understand the connection. And it's almost like too, you know, okay, so I don't see this person right now, but am I gonna see him later? Almost like okay, so when Mimi comes to visit us in Japan or Dubai and then she goes back, you know Is the same thing because we're not gonna see her, then right.

0:11:10 - Allison
It's hard for her so kind of conceptualize the whole whole thing, which I get. It's confusing for me and I'm grown Right right.

0:11:18 - Cyndi
But you know, you definitely, though, have those feelings. You know when it happens. You know, for me, I went through, I guess, in a sense, what they call it like Livers remorse or something like that. It's like, I guess, like people who Survival, survivors remorse, you know, who didn't die, you feel like guilty, or whatever. You know, and I still have those questions in my head. You know, did I do everything I could possibly do? Did I miss something? Was it something else I could have done? And even though in my Head I know I did, but still in my heart is always like, you know, maybe I could have done this and he could, could have still been here.

But you know, going through all of that, you know it doesn't help you at all in the long run. And then that whole feeling, like you know, things are never, ever going to be the same, and they're not. And I tell you know friends of mine who lose not only you know a spouse or a family, you know mother, father. Whatever I tell them, you know the grief never goes away and, in a sense, the sadness never really goes away. You just learn how to live with it, right, yeah, so that's basically how life goes. You don't ever get over it, but you learn how to live with it and adapt to it.

0:12:33 - Allison
Yeah, I mean, I I guess that's been like my biggest kind of Takeaway is that like life doesn't stop. You know what I'm saying. Like you kind of feel like everything is going to come to a screeching halt and you don't understand how it's going to continue. But life doesn't stop moving and you, you can't, literally, you literally can't stop living. And so you know, sooner or later you just look up and you're like wow, it's been a year. Wow, it's been three years, wow, it's been five, wow, it's been 13. And you know, it doesn't, it doesn't ever feel necessarily real a hundred percent. But You'll look up one day and realize that you, you did keep living and that you are okay.

You know what I'm saying and that life does go on to a certain degree.

0:13:20 - Cyndi
I think some of it too is that you know, for some people we have, you know they're bigger than life, to not only us they're family members but to other people too. And it's like you know, we know the cycle of life you live, you're born, you're born, you live, you die. But there's just some people that you just never expect to die. Yeah, and for me he was one of those people. You know, he was just my Superman and I never, I just, even when he got sick and just going through the whole process, I never really expected him not to be here.

0:13:59 - Allison
Yeah, and you know, I wonder if that's just like a daddy thing or if everyone feels that way about their person that they lost. Because I feel the same way and for me it's just like because, you know, daddy was like, so well known. He was such a huge part of, obviously, like our family, but he was such a huge part of a lot of people's lives. You know what I'm saying. If you asked 10 people on the street they would all have said, oh, charles is my best friend, you know what I'm saying.

And so well known and so out and about and kind of a who's who type of person, I feel like for a lot of people not just us it didn't seem like that would ever end. And you know, like people do say like wow, like Atlanta has not been the same since. And I'm not trying to make it sound like he was some celebrity, but in his own way he kind of was. He was one of those people who you know was just kind of an influencer in his own right before it was even a thing. And it feels like people always say like the city hasn't been the same.

0:15:10 - Cyndi
Yeah, it's like people just gravitated to him and you know, just when he walked in the room, everybody just wanted to be around him. He was just like a people magnet or something. You know. Everybody just wanted to be around him. Everybody wanted to say that they knew him, whether they did or not. And for him he had that personality and you and Harper and Jackson's developing it to have a lot of his personality, where you know you can walk into a room and just captivate the room. You think.

Yeah, and I love that about you and your kids though you guys definitely got that from him, not from me, because you know I'm perfectly happy back off in a corner somewhere being invisible, but you know you definitely got that from him. And it's so funny that, cause people will sometimes say to me too, oh, how's your baby? And I'm like what baby you and Charles's baby? I'm like, well, the baby is 33 years old now. She's been married for almost 10 years. She has two children and they're like, oh my God, little Allison. I remember when and I'm like, well, yes, oh my God, time has definitely gone on. I know Charles would be so excited and he would just love these grandkids. And then, you know, this whole spiel would go on. And I remember when X, Y and Z, and I'm like, yeah, you know, people still have these wonderful memories of him, but, which makes me smile too, that he just brightened up so many people's lives.

0:16:37 - Allison
Yeah, I agree. Well, I think that you know it goes without saying that losing a father and losing a husband are two different things and they feel different and they come with a different kind of grief. You know, do you still feel like you kind of live with a piece of you?

0:16:55 - Cyndi
missing?

Yes, I definitely do. And it's so weird, though, because after I met Derek who's my new husband and everybody and we started dating, a lot of our conversations centered around my relationship with Charles and my love for him, and once I started to fall in love with Derek, I was still able to kind of explain to him I love you, but understand that it doesn't mean that I don't still love Charles too, even though he's not here. There's a part of me that will always love him, that will always be his wife too, although I'm your wife too, so it's kind of like a sharing kind of thing. That was also a period of time where I felt like, well, I didn't date for a very long time, and even when I did start dating Derek, I went through this period where I felt like I was cheating, which is kind of weird, but I guess maybe I don't know if other widows have gone through that, but I felt like I was cheating on Charles, even though he wasn't here.

But Derek was always very understanding about my relationship with Charles, even to the point where he was like oh, I know you love me, I know you're my wife, whatever, you don't have to change your name. And I was like, well, no, I'm going to take your name too. And he was like, well, why don't you just add my name to your name? Where a lot of husbands would have been like that part of your life is over, but he was all for me, remaining Cynthia Mathis, now Lewis, and so I have to give him credit for being secure enough in himself to be able to handle that.

But I definitely feel like there's still a part of me missing. Charles was like my first love. I met him when I was 19 years old and we were together until I was like 48, 49 years old so that's a long time. So I definitely do feel like there's a part of me still missing. There's a part of me that always again wonders what would have happened or what could have happened, how our lives would be, if he were still here. I look at you still, like I said, in your kids, and I see so much of him and I just I can feel him, though, just being so proud of you and everything that you have accomplished in your life from your schooling, your career, your marriage, your kids and I just know that he is just so, so proud of you, and that makes me really happy too.

0:19:39 - Allison
Yeah, I appreciate that, and I think that that is probably the main difference between what I think it would probably feel like losing a spouse versus losing a father. It's like I actually don't really feel like a piece of me is missing per se, and I don't really, I don't know. It just doesn't feel like, oh, a piece of me is missing since my dad passed. What it does feel like, however, or what does come up for me a lot, is the what ifs that you spoke to, like wow, like how would life be different if it were here? Like what would his relationship be like with my kids?

0:20:17 - Cyndi
How would Spalled worse than they already are? Yeah.

0:20:20 - Allison
I think it would be so spoiled. What type of grandfather would he be to Harper and Jackson? How would they kind of relate to him? What type of special things would they do together? Just, I do a lot of the time ask myself and find myself thinking about how things would look if he were still there, and sometimes that is the part that makes me sad. More than feeling like a piece of myself is missing, is kind of like, oh wow, like what would life be like? And then you know, as you know, a Christian, I always bring myself back to the fact that, like, god always has a plan. And I'm like, I feel, like I'm a believer, that like, if you change one thing, you change everything. And so I'm like, well, who's to say? Like, if you know, if daddy hadn't passed away 13 years ago, that my life would even look the way it looks now?

Everything you know, the whole course of my life could have been different. And so I remind myself of that when I do kind of start to what if-ing, because you can't, you can't just bring one person in but leave, bring one person back but leave everything else the same. It doesn't really work like that. I don't think, and I do believe that God always has a plan and even at the time, you know, when it's hard for us to see it, it does always kind of come together. You know, full picture, full, not full picture. What's the word Big picture? Big picture in the end.

But you know, that's, I think, the differences for me. I feel like it's just kind of a lot of like what ifs and how would life be different for me? How would life be different, you know, for my kids? Like even as simple as, like us, we just looked at a public school. We've been looking at schools for Harper and I'm kind of thinking like if daddy was alive, we probably wouldn't even be looking at these public schools because he would be like nope, they're going to XYZ school and like it's over with. I've already made a call, they're already in no life, it's done you know Exactly.

0:22:17 - Cyndi
Yeah, I agree with that. And you know, for me too, especially after he passed, you know that 10 years that I did not date, you know, for me it was like the quiet times, like from like I would say like midnight to, like, you know, five am. Those were the hardest times for me, because everything was perfectly still and quiet. Everybody else was asleep, so there was nothing that I could do to. I couldn't go anywhere or do anything to distract myself, so I was just there with all of my like memories, and so that was like really, really hard.

So I would like, I think during that time I started journaling a lot just to get out you know what I was feeling, and I encouraged so many people to do that. You may think you don't really have anything to say, just whatever's on your mind, just start, just write it down, just to get it out. But you know you do go through that thing where you feel like, okay, everything now is just over, everything just stops right here. But you know you have to first of all push yourself for your kids, if you have them, and also for yourself. But I also keep in mind that your loved one wouldn't want you to just give up on life. You know their life had purpose and had meaning.

So you know it's good to try to remember that and try to push yourself to. You know, in your own way. What can I do to you know, make them proud or make, incorporate them still in my life? I think, you know, we started traveling a lot because your dad had always, you know, said he wanted to take us to this place and that place but of course, being a class, a workaholic, he never would take the time to do those things you know, out of the country. So you know, I'm gonna go to all these places and I'm going to see them for the both of us and try to make that memory and maybe like, okay, I'm not just doing this for me, I'm doing this for him, and he's looking down on heaven and he's seeing this through my eyes.

0:24:24 - Allison
So so you know we've kind of touched obviously on you finding love again with Derek. How did you decide to date like period you?

0:24:41 - Cyndi
You basically pushed me into that because I was not even doing like social media and any of that stuff. And you were like no, you know, mom, everybody wants to know how you're doing what you're doing. So you know, I know how you are You're not gonna like talk to people. You know, call people or talk to people. So you know, we're gonna start you a Facebook page. You know, first I think this first came for Instagram and then, you know, we can kind of document some of our trips and then people can see. You know what you're doing, and I think that was kind of the beginning of it. And you were also like you know, mom, you know I'm out of the country nine months out of the year. You know, I really worry about you just being sitting at home when you're not, you know, traveling with me, coming to visit me. So you know, I really think it's time that you just, you know, just find someone just to hang out with.

So you are the catalyst in all of this.

0:25:32 - Allison
Yeah, I mean, I did really want you to date and like I wanted you to, you know, have someone that besides me, like, who was kind of like your person and your partner, someone to do life with, Cause I just do believe that life is not meant to be done, you know, in isolation, like totally alone. So I did really want you to have a person you know to do life with. I'm, you know, I'm glad that I pushed you a little bit, you know, to do that, and I know you kind of said that it did feel like you were kind of cheating at first and it was like a hard.

0:26:12 - Cyndi
It was really hard yeah.

0:26:14 - Allison
Do you? I mean, I guess you don't regret it, you got married.

0:26:17 - Cyndi
So no, I don't regret it. But you know, it's really funny too. Even how Derek and I met, because I think you and I were leaving for France like the next day and we had this mutual Charles and I had this friend and he was getting married and had asked me begged me to come to the wedding, Said they wanted to do something for Charles at the wedding. And I was like I really don't want to do this. You know, I'm just, you know, I'm just not into mind space, I'm just, I just don't want to. And so you were like, no, mom, you know, they really ask you to come, you really gotta go. And I'm like, okay, well, if I'm going, you're going as my date. So we go to this wedding and you know, we're sitting there and just trying to wait until it's over. They make their little speech about Charles and whatever. I think we eat some food, I think you make me get up and dance or whatever. And so I was like, okay, let's, everybody's doing something, let's sneak out. So we leave.

Well, I leave and go to France the next day and a couple of days later I get this Facebook message from this guy. I was like, hey, you know, saw you at the wedding, at the wedding ask about you. And when I came over to try to talk to you you were gone. Yada, yada, yada. And I was like, hmm, don't know, you never saw you. But if my friend says that you're an okay guy, then you know we can converse and that was kind of how that whole thing happened. I never saw him, he saw me, but I was like, oh, I must have really.

0:27:44 - Allison
But like, doesn't that kind of feel like daddy had a hand in it? Because the only reason we were even there was because of daddy. Like this was you know his, they were our friends but they were his friends and you know you didn't want to go, type thing. I don't know. Like you know, I kind of believe in stuff like that.

0:28:03 - Cyndi
You know, I, probably I had not thought about that, but you know, you, you, I think you're probably right, because I do feel like from heaven he has still guided my life in so many directions and is still like touching me and you know, just, he's still very hands-on, yeah you've kind of become in your own right, kind of like a Spokesperson, not really publicly but privately, like four widows and four, you know, finding love again and for kind of life after loss.

0:28:39 - Allison
I know you shared with me that you. You also have another friend who, I think, lost her husband to cancer, who kind of leaned on you Because a lot of people do feel very alone as they walk through that and of course it's a club that no one wants to be a member of, exactly, but you are able to offer, you know, support to people, and I've, I've, I have that same situation With some of my friends as well. Like me and one of my very, very best friends both lost our our dads. She's older than me but we both lost our dads in our early 20s and so we can kind of, you know, relate in in that. What experience or you know, practical advice do you usually offer to other widows you know, as they kind of go through the grieving process and Maybe even when it comes to looking for love again eventually?

0:29:29 - Cyndi
I. The first thing I tell them is that grief has no blueprint and has no timetable. What grief looks like for you is not what grief looked like for me, mm-hmm, and the time that I grieve and start to feel better is not going to be on your time schedule. So, first of all, don't let anyone try to dip, try to dictate to you how to grieve the person that you love because, they can't, they don't know.

Also, don't let anyone tell you when it's time for you to stop grieving the person that you love, because, again, there's no time schedule. So I tell them, you know, take everything day by day. The first thing you have to do, I think, though, is you don't want to get rid of all of their things, so you don't want to make them feel like they never existed in your life, but there are things that you do have to purge from your life. Like, it was very important for me to get rid of your dad's clothes. I couldn't have them just hanging in the closet, seeing them every day, so I had to, you know, get rid of those things, keep a few things that were Sentimental to me, and give you know his friends and family members, whatever they wanted. But just, you saw, you have to start making that separation If possible. You also need to find another place to live.

It's hard to still stay in that place that you shared with you know, your heart, because you're again surrounded by all those memories. So, if you, if you can, you know, move. If you can't move, kind of redecorate and and now make the space Not your space, not not your space as a couple. Make it your own personal space so that you can still have that closest but also have that closure, so to speak, right. You know those things are to me, are really, really important, and also understand that, yes, you feel like the Sun is never, ever going to shine again, but if you can just take it one hour at a time, one day at a time, it will.

You know, try to keep yourself busy, try not to sit and just, you know, feel all those feelings, although you do have to let yourself, right now, those waves when you feel like crying, cry. If you feel like laughing, cursing, whatever the case may be, do that because, again, that's all a part of your healing process. So you have to let yourself go through those emotions and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. Don't let anybody tell you how you're supposed to feel. As far as you know finding love again, just be open.

You know you don't go out seeking love again because you know I didn't, nobody does. But just be open to the fact that if someone comes in to your life and they could put a smile on your face, you know you like them, your kids like them, they fit into your family. There's nothing wrong with you Sharing your space and giving that love to someone else, right? Everyone needs to feel love, so there's nothing wrong with that. Yes, you are gonna feel some amount of guilt, but I think that's only normal, because you did love the person that you lost. But they would not want you again being alone and just wallowing and just that you know solitude, right, it's not good for you and it really wastes their memory.

0:33:06 - Allison
I love all of those you know pieces of advice, and I think that someone somewhere out there is, you know, dealing with loss and you're, you've been such an inspiration even to me, as I've watched you walk through this for the last decade and walked through it with you, because it's just like an example of you know no one wants to lose anyone, ever, of course but like you've been such a shining example of the fact that we can do hard things and that we can keep living through, you know, after those hard things and so I appreciate you for modeling that for me even on the hard days, that you know you can keep going and persevere. I know that that sounds kind of cliche but I'm serious, I appreciate that.

0:33:53 - Cyndi
Yeah, and, like I said, that I still have my my days. You know the anniversary of his death, you know our wedding anniversary, his birthday and even just on just a random day, I may, you know, I may hear the song that was played at our wedding, or just you know. Like you said, I'll sometimes see someone who looks like him and you know, just randomly, or I'll be out eating and just feel like I expect him to walk through that door.

0:34:21 - Allison
I still don't listen to dance with my father. So I understand that, Like everyone that is close to me knows, like sometimes me and DJ will be on the car and they'll kind of be on shuffle like Luther Band drops and it'll come on and he'll be like I'm like, yeah, you know I don't listen to the song, Okay, I had to turn off the song that we played at our wedding to like.

0:34:38 - Cyndi
so they're just just little things that you know will still like, just make me have chills and like that as much as he got on my nerves, hanging his clothes on the door knobs and just just little things, his little things like that and I just like gosh, I missed that.

0:34:53 - Allison
Yeah, I feel the same way. You know, I still sometimes wish that I had like a voicemail recorded somewhere and unfortunately, with all the advancement, the technologies, phone changes, all that stuff I don't have that anymore and I wish that I did. But I'm thankful for the things that I do have. And actually I think that Coco probably still has some home videos of when her kids were babies that maybe you should one day make a day out of it, you know, because even though it can be hard, it can also be healing and I do sometimes like to watch my sweet 16 for that reason.

0:35:28 - Cyndi
Yeah.

0:35:29 - Allison
Because you can hear his voice and like it's just such a, just a scene.

0:35:33 - Cyndi
Yeah.

0:35:34 - Allison
It's really an example of our me and daddy's relationship, like completely. You know what I'm saying and it's just funny to me to get to kind of watch that back.

0:35:43 - Cyndi
You should show that to Harper. Yeah, she's seeing it and she, she thinks it's hilarious, she's like is that mommy, me, me, funny, funny, funny stuff.

0:35:53 - Allison
But you know this has been a fun episode to record. As much as talking about grief can be fun and I thank you, mom, for sharing you know so candidly about your experience and about finding love again and all of that I did want to talk a little bit about, like how we have navigated, especially like my big days, like my graduation, my wedding and stuff like that, without daddy being present. We have kind of made a space for him, you know, through involving him and his memory. So I figured that we would talk about that in our extra over on Patreon. If you're not a subscriber to our Patreon, make sure that you head on over there and subscribe so that you can hear us talk a little bit more about life after loss and you know how we've still involved my dad in the big days and be sure to follow us on all the socials. We are at Kintzuki Conversations. I'm sure we will be kind of sharing more about this there as well.

0:36:58 - Cyndi
Yeah, thanks for listening. Come back soon to join us for our very next episode. See you soon, guys.