 In December 2000, my father passed away (from what we know from the autopsy) from coronary artery disease.  He collapsed on the street 2 houses down from my Mom's on December 1, 2000.  Her street is not very busy, so nobody saw him for maybe 30 minutes.

I was living in Norcross, GA at the time.  It was a Friday night and I had just got home from work and sat down on the couch to relax and I got a call from my sister-in-law to tell me that had found him on the road and the ambulance had come and taken him to the hospital.  He was pronounced dead at the hospital.

I was at my apartment clutching the phone wanting it to ring to get an update.  Was he going to be okay?  Do the doctors know anything?  Instead of a phone call, I got a visit from my aunt and my cousin... as soon as I answered the door and saw who was there, I knew something was wrong.  They broke the news to me.  It was the hardest thing I have ever had to hear.

Not only was I devastated, but I felt guilty that I wasn't there for my family.  I was 4 hours away.  My mom told my aunt and my cousin to drive me home.  She did not want me driving myself.  My aunt and cousin had to go back to their house to pack.  It seemingly took hours.  Hours that I could have used to drive home.  I stared at my car knowing I could leave.  But I remembered what my Mom had said.  I did not drive home.  She had enough on her mind to worry about me driving.

I got home and the weekend was surreal.  I took a week off of work.  We had to go to the funeral home to make arrangements and goto the Church to make further arrangements with the Priest.  My Dad wanted a full Catholic funeral.  So, we had a wake before the viewing began.  The viewing lasted more than 3 hours of solid hugs, handshaking, and tears.

The funeral was at Our Lady, Queen of the Universe Catholic Church in Huntsville.  I will say that this was the most comforting funeral service (funeral mass) that I have been a part of.  Even though, my Dad was gone, I felt at peace for that time.

All of my uncles and my Grandfather came down from Seattle for the week.  I was good to see them, but I sure would have preferred it to have been under better circumstances.

<a href="http://tribute.mmolenda.com" target="_blank">This is the tribute site that I setup for my father.</a>

<a href="http://tribute.mmolenda.com/docs.htm" target="_blank">Here you will find several tributes and other items.</a>

One last thing, this is the last thing that he gave me:

<img src="http://tribute.mmolenda.com/docs/LastThing.jpg" />

I have only ever played it twice.  I ripped into iTunes so that I could listen to it.  It is now part of the centerpiece of my coffee table which includes some of the items I placed into the link above.

Through reading this and my tribute page, you can only get a small sense of who my Dad was.  I miss him each and every day.