Reflections of my weekend

I don't want to offend anyone by my observation so if I do I apologize.

I have never spread any ones ashes before, nor have I ever seen the ashes of someones body. So it was weird and hard to have to pull the bag of ashes out of the box we got from the funeral home and see what they looked like. It was even harder/weirder to know this once was my fathers body that now was in a bag tied together with a zip tie. I was the one to spread them, my sister told me she couldn't do it.

The ashes are spread, finally after 2 years of wondering where to spread them and find time to spread them. As I said it was weird and hard. There are other words to describe how I felt but I wont go into to much detail on my emotions. We walked out onto a dock that was secluded from every one else. Rhonda holding Hannah's hand, Jordan standing next to where I was kneeling and we said our goodbyes, the lords prayer and I slowly dumped the ashes into the lake. Jordan was very sweet and as we were walking down the dock back to the car he turned and said "goodbye grandpa, I miss you and will always love you" Hannah obviously didn't understand what was going on, but she sat there watching and I one day will be able to tell her she was there with us when we spread his ashes.

Everyone said it would be closure, so why don't I feel like it is?

This whole experience has filled me with the what ifs in life.

What if my mom and dad never divorced? What if he didn't gamble and lie? What if he didn't disappear out of our lives and was more of an active part of it? What would life have been like?

I love my step dad, and he became more of a dad to me, and a grandfather to my kids then my dad was, but I still wish and wonder things could have been different. Maybe, just maybe if my dad had chose a different path, took better care of himself, stayed in touch and was more active after the divorce we would have been closer and maybe he would be alive and I wouldn't have felt like he died along time ago, not just two years ago. I mean he is my dad, and I love him, I will always love him and miss him, but he pushed us away, like he forgot about us and I just wish for him and for us (my kids, my sister and brother, and me) that things would have been different. But all the wondering doesn't change life, doesn't change the past and it gets me know where but feeling guilty for wondering those things.