What Should Have Been, a poem

I wasn't ready to stop counting.

There was a college graduation I already pictured.

There was a first real job I never got to hear about.

Practicing your interview..

The phone call. The excitement in your voice "Dad, I got the job!".

Me pretending I wasn't already telling everyone I knew.

There was a call about a lease you needed me to look over.

A call about a car that made a noise you didn't trust.

A call just to ask if I thought you were making the right choice.

There was advice I never got to give (badly at times).

Money stuff. Relationship stuff.

The kind you'd nod along to and then do your own thing anyway.

I would've let you. I always would've let you.

There was a nursery I never painted.

Small shoes by the door.

I had grandchildren I was already spoiling.

Taught them nothing. Loved them anyway.

The ones who'd call me Pop, or Grandpa, or something

we would've decided on together, over a beer on the porch.

There was a whole life running past me

like a train I was supposed to catch later.

I was supposed to catch it later.

Instead I stand at the station

holding a ticket for a trip that isn't coming.

Milestones don't cancel quietly.

They just... don't arrive.

No graduation. No interview. No first job.

No 2 a.m. phone call asking how to fix a leaking sink.

No sleepless nights holding my grandchild in my arms

to ensure you get your rest.

I keep the version of the future where you're in it.

I don't know where else to put it.

So I write it down instead.

Not because it happened.

Because it should have.