Notes to Aliyah: Holding me accountable
This is the first of what might become a series of notes I’m sharing to my daughter Aliyah who died suddenly on March 9, 2022. I’m sharing this in part to extract some meaning, in part so that my grief may be witnessed, in part because writing is a salve.
Aliyah, I miss how you used to hold me accountable. To being a better person, to being more authentic to myself.
Sometimes you held me accountable in a hilarious way. I remember one warm spring evening when you were six years old. I was lying in your bed, trying to read you a story to end the day, and you were flopping around like a fish out of water, bedtime procrastination. I started to get frustrated and short with you, and you responded without missing a beat, “Daddy, how about you be the parent and I’ll be the kid.” Gosh you could be sassy!
Sometimes you held me accountable after I lost my shit, when I was yelling in one of those moments of weakness, impatience, and frustration. You would cry and get upset, and in doing so put a mirror up to the person I was being at the time. The person I didn’t want to be. But you didn’t just walk away. You would courageously challenge me to look in that mirror, demanding that I say that I’m sorry and asking to talk it through. And we would do just that, talking about what led me to the outburst, and then how my emotions got the best of me. You would ask to figure out how we could, together, make sure that I didn’t lose myself to an emotional outburst again. Of course it did happen again, here and there, but over the years less frequently, and differently. With more patience. With more understanding of who you were and how you were.
Sometimes that accountability would also show up with you forthrightly telling me, “Daddy, I’m not the same as you. I’m different from the way that you are. I’m my own person.” That might have been in response to me pushing you a little bit too hard. Telling you to ‘tough it out’ or ‘suck it up’ too much or inappropriately. Or maybe it was me explaining how I would go about doing something. You would often look at me and say, “listen, I know that’s how you would go about it, but that’s not how I do this Daddy.” Gosh, what an incredible person you were to be able to let me know that, with kindness, with understanding, patiently teaching me how to be a better, more accepting parent.
You also indirectly held me accountable in ways that maybe weren’t so explicit. I would make choices day to day, moment to moment, to be more giving to others, because I would think about how giving you are — to everyone around you. I would pick up garbage from the park. I would take a reusable cup to get coffee. I would want to make you proud.
I’d make choices about how much I would want to immerse myself in work or paying attention to some electronic device or another, versus being present with the people around me. Often this was with you: Seeing you playing Lego or whatever it was, and being so overwhelming compelled to sit down with you and put any device aside, to spend time with you. I would realize in those moments that human connection was more important.
You held me accountable to the big choices too, especially decisions on what I would want to professionally devote myself to. When Kate Graham approached me to run her campaign, I sat down to explain to you that this would mean me getting behind an incredible leader, but it would mean that the months ahead would be busy. I remember you lit up telling me that you were so excited about a woman leading the Ontario Liberals, and that if Kate could do it maybe you could some day. That was all I needed. And gosh you looked up to Kate so much.
I remember my next big career choice, just a bit over a year ago, I came to you with multiple options. I explained them all thoroughly and you asked insightful questions. And then I remember you going on, what one could only describe as, a rant — that we need to clean up our filthy planet, that we need to do something about climate change, that we need to stop wasting so much plastic. This lasted a few minutes! My choice was clear.
So ya, those are a few of the small ways that you held me accountable to my values, to be a better version of myself.
I guess moving forward I have to channel all of this on my own: “What would Aliyah think? How might Aliyah hold me accountable?”
I love you and I miss you Aliyah.
Love,
Daddy
