Every summer when watermelon came into season, we often kept one on the counter to be eaten, slice by slice, over the course of a day or two. My Mom, brother, and I all ate watermelon like normal people: in tire-sized rounds or half-moon ends. But my Dad had the mind-boggingly frustrating habit of digging the watermelon meat out with a spoon so that when someone else came along and sliced off a piece it invariably fell to the plate like a slice of Swiss Cheese.

But then he died. And it is funny the things you miss about people when they are gone. Maybe there was watermelon the summer he died but I can’t remember through the fog of grief covering those days. But the following year I went home to my Mom’s for Labor Day weekend and there was a watermelon on the counter. And there were holes in it. She had started to eat watermelon the way my Dad used to. And instead of annoying me, this fact both comforted me and also made me regret how this one little weird habit, among others, is something I could have ever been annoyed with him over rather than celebrate as a quirk in his personality. So this is how I try to eat my watermelon now: standing over the sink, eating a good dozen spoonfuls of watermelon, remembering this is how my Dad did it, then walking away and leaving it for later.

It’s been five years plus since he left this world. On Father’s Day, I am thinking again about how my grief has become like watermelon holes: how his presence is felt in his absence, how his love remains with us, how blessedly, frustratingly human he was, I am, we are. And how I wish I could have remembered that better while he was still alive. I hope I can better learn to make space for the watermelon holes, the imperfections, the annoying habits in myself and others before I have to memorialize them or they me. I know for many there is more bitterness than sweetness when they remember their fathers, grief that can sit like gaping holes of pain without any fruit. This is one of those days that can hit in a hundred different ways. But in this moment, I am having a good cry and celebrating the watermelon holes. I love you, Dad.